Role of tectonic inheritance in the instauration of Tunisian Atlassic fold-and-thrust belt: Case of Bouhedma – Boudouaou structures

•Tectonic inversion in Central-Southern Atlas is performed through different approaches.•Mesozoic extensional events were contemporary with a generalized rifting.•Mesozoic events are proven by dramatic thickness changes of sedimentary series.•Cenozoic compressional events emphasizes tectonic inversion.•Deformations are explained though field data.

Tectonic inversion in the Bouhedma-Boudouaou Mountains was investigated through recent field work and seismic lines interpretation calibrated with petroleum well data. Located to the Central-Southern Atlas of Tunisia, this area signed shortened intra-continental fold-and-thrust belts. Two dissymmetric anticlines characterize Bouhedma – Boudouaou major fold. These structures show a strong virgation respectively from E-W to NNE-SSW as a response to the interference between both tectonic inversion and tectonic inheritance.This complex geometry is driven by Mesozoic rifting, which marked an extensional inherited regime. A set of late Triassic-Early Jurassic E-W and NW-SE normal faults dipping respectively to the North and to the East seems to widely affect the overall geodynamic evolution of this domain. They result in major thickness changes across the hanging wall and the footwall blocks in response with the rifting activity.Tectonic inversion is inferred from convergence between African and European plates since late Cretaceous. During Serravalian - Tortonian event, NW-SE trending paroxysm led to: 1) folding of pre-inversion and syn-inversion strata, 2) reactivation of pre-existing normal faults to reverse ones and 3) orogeny of the main structures with NE-SW and E-W trending.The compressional feature still remains active during Quaternary event (Post-Villafranchian) with N-S trending compression. Contraction during inversion generates folding and internal deformation as well as Fault-Propagation-Fold and folding related strike.