The Amazonian Craton is a
geologic province located in
South America
South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere at the northern tip of the continent. It can also be described as the sou ...
. It occupies a large portion of the central, north and eastern part of the continent and represents one of Earth's largest
craton
A craton (, , or ; from grc-gre, κράτος "strength") is an old and stable part of the continental lithosphere, which consists of Earth's two topmost layers, the crust and the uppermost mantle. Having often survived cycles of merging and ...
ic regions. The
Guiana Shield
The Guiana Shield (french: Plateau des Guyanes, Bouclier guyanais; nl, Hoogland van Guyana, Guianaschild; pt, Planalto das Guianas, Escudo das Guianas; es, Escudo guayanés) is one of the three cratons of the South American Plate. It is a ...
and Central Brazil Shield (Guaporé Shield) constitute respectively the northern and southern
exhumed parts of the craton. Between the two shields lies the
Amazon Rift, a zone of weakness within the craton. Smaller cratons of
Precambrian
The Precambrian (or Pre-Cambrian, sometimes abbreviated pꞒ, or Cryptozoic) is the earliest part of Earth's history, set before the current Phanerozoic Eon. The Precambrian is so named because it preceded the Cambrian, the first period of th ...
rocks south of the Amazonian Shield are the
Río de la Plata Craton
The Rio de la Plata Craton (RPC) is a medium-sized continental block found in Uruguay, eastern Argentina and southern Brazil. During its complex and protracted history it interacted with a series other blocks and is therefore considered importan ...
and the
São Francisco Craton, which lies to the east.
The Río Apa Craton at the
Paraguay
Paraguay (; ), officially the Republic of Paraguay ( es, República del Paraguay, links=no; gn, Tavakuairetã Paraguái, links=si), is a landlocked country in South America. It is bordered by Argentina to the south and southwest, Brazil to t ...
-Brazil border is considered be likely just the southern part of the Amazonian Craton.
The rocks of Río Apa were deformed during the
Sunsás orogeny.
It has been suggested that the
Late Mesoproterozoic–
Early Neoproterozoic aged
Sveconorwegian Orogen in
Fennoscandia
__NOTOC__
Fennoscandia ( Finnish, Swedish and no, Fennoskandia, nocat=1; russian: Фенноскандия, Fennoskandiya) or the Fennoscandian Peninsula is the geographical peninsula in Europe, which includes the Scandinavian and Kola penin ...
could have been caused by a
continent–continent collision between the Amazonia and
Baltica.
The question is open if Telemarkia
terrane
In geology, a terrane (; in full, a tectonostratigraphic terrane) is a crust fragment formed on a tectonic plate (or broken off from it) and accreted or " sutured" to crust lying on another plate. The crustal block or fragment preserves its ow ...
in
Norway
Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic countries, Nordic country in Northern Europe, the mainland territory of which comprises the western and northernmost portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula. The remote Arctic island of ...
was derived from the Amazonian Craton but this possibility does not imply necessarily that there was a continental collision.
See also
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References
Further reading
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Cratons
Geology of South America
Historical tectonic plates
Historical continents
Geology of Brazil
Precambrian South America
Geology of Santa Cruz Department (Bolivia)
{{Continents of the world