Detrital zircons from the Ordovician rocks of the Pyrenees: Geochronological constraints and provenance

• LA-ICP-MS U-Pb detrital zircon analysis have been used to suggest a maximum depositional age for the Cambro-Ordovician rocks of the Pyrenees.
• The main detrital zircon age populations from these rocks are described.
• The main age populations have been compared with age populations from other Perigondwanan terrains in order to better locate the Pyrenees in the northern Gondwana margin.

The first LA-ICP-MS U–Pb detrital zircon ages from quartzites located below (three samples) and above (one sample) the Upper Ordovician unconformity in the Central Pyrenees (the Rabassa Dome, Andorra) were investigated. The maximum depositional age for the Jújols Group, below the unconformity, based on the youngest detrital zircon population, is around 475 Ma (Early Ordovician), whereas for the Bar Quartzite Fm., above the unconformity, the presence of only two zircons of 442 and 443 Ma precludes obtaining a precise maximum sedimentation age. A time gap of ~ 20 million years for the Upper Ordovician unconformity in the Pyrenees can be proposed, similar to that of the Sardic unconformity in Sardinia. The similar age patterns obtained on both sides of the Upper Ordovician unconformity suggest that there was no change in the source area of these series, while the absence of a Middle Ordovician age population may be due to a lack of sedimentation at that time. The four study samples present very similar U–Pb age patterns: the main age populations correspond to Neoproterozoic (Ediacarian–Cryogenian, ca. 550–750 Ma); Grenvillian (Tonian–Stenian, ca. 850–1100 Ma); Paleoproterozoic (Orosirian, ca.1900–2100 Ma) and Neoarchean (ca. 2500–2650 Ma). The similarity with the Sardinian age distribution suggests that these two terranes could share the same source area and that they were paleogeographically close in Ordovician times in front of the Arabian–Nubian Shield.