An Outline of the Geology of Poland

The complexity of Poland's geology is due to its location at the junction of three major geological provinces of Europe: (1) the East European Precambrian PlatformEast European Precambrian Platform, (2) the Palaeozoic PlatformPalaeozoic Platform, and (3) the Carpathians. The East European Platform corresponds to an old and stable Precambrian craton, extending over the eastern half of the continent and mostly covered by weakly deformed Proterozoic to Phanerozoic sediments. Although the Precambrian Platform is approximately limited from the southwest by the Teisseyre-Tornquist ZoneTeisseyre-Tornquist Zone (TTZ), the attenuated East European cratonic crustCrust continues in south-westerly direction, underneath the Palaeozoic Platform of central and western Poland. The latter includes Ediacaran-Palaeozoic, pre-Permian sediments, partly folded and thrustThrust, thrusting faulted during the CaledonianCaledonian and VariscanVariscan cycles. The Palaeozoic PlatformPalaeozoic Platform also comprises accreted VariscanVariscan and Cadomian crustal domains of the Sudetes and the Upper Silesian BlockUpper Silesian Block, respectively. Soon after cessation of the VariscanVariscan orogeny, the Palaeozoic Platform was affected by early Permian continental riftingContinental rifting and following thermal subsidence in the Mesozoic. The Permian-Mesozoic basin was inverted in the Late Cretaceous-early PaleogenePalaeogene (Paleogene) as a far-field effect of the collision between Northern Europe and the Alpine-Carpathian orogen. Both the East European CratonEast European Craton and the Palaeozoic PlatformPalaeozoic Platform were overridden in the Paleogene-Miocene by the outer Western Carpathians fold-and-thrustFold-and-thrust belt. Further south, the Pieniny KlippenKlippen Belt represents a tectonic suture separating the East European Craton and the Palaeozoic Platform from tectonic elements derived from the southerly Adria Plate.