The Sequence of Magmatic-Tectonic Events and Orogenic Processes of the Yanshan Belt, North China

This paper emphasizes that the interactive constraints of geology and isotopic dating is the best approach to construct the geological event sequence, and has compiled 106 data of reasonable isotopic ages for the igneous rocks of the Yanshan belt. We propose a sequence of mgmatic-tectonic events in the Jurassic-Cretaceous Yanshan orogen of North China. Five orogenic episodes are divided, (1) pre-and initial orogenic episode (Early Jurassic); (2) early orogenic episode (Middle Jurassic); (3) peak orogenic episode (Late Jurassic); (4) late orogenic episode (early Early Cretaceous), and (5) post-orogenic episode. Each episode is a short cycle, all of the orogenic processes construct a longer cycle, and they, in general, followed a counter-clockwise (ccw) PTt path. Finally, it is suggested that the Yanshanian movement was so intensive that the magmatism and tectonic deformation had involved all the lithosphere thickness and the late-Achaean-formed cratonic lithosphere had been significantly reworked.