Research on the Ediacaran and Cambrian of the Anti-Atlas and High Atlas Mountains, Morocco: An historical overview

• Overview of geological and paleontological discoveries in Morocco (1917–1995).
• SGM, coordinator and publisher of geological maps and regional monographies.
• Fallotaspis a Moroccan Trilobite changing the lower limit of the Cambrian in 1952.
• Morocco not qualified for PC-C boundary officially fixed in Newfoundland (1992).
• Morocco, a possible candidate for international biostratigraphic subdivisions.

Two periods of geological research can be recognized in the Ediacaran and Cambrian of Morocco. The period 1917–1945 is represented by an exploration phase that led to numerous discoveries of Cambrian faunas overlying conformably or unconformably, thick, metamorphic, Precambrian formations. The Moroccan Geological Society (SGM) published numerous geological maps with notices and regional monographies. The second period (1948–1995) allowed erection of detailed litho- and biostratigraphic sketches for stratigraphic subdivisions, among which the proposal of alternative (radiometric and chemostratigraphic) methods to precisely locate the Precambrian–Cambrian boundary in Morocco.