Carbonate platform deposits characterize the Salento peninsula (southernmost Apulia), which is part of the foreland of the Apenninic chain. The Meso-Cenozoic successions of this domain are discontinuous and affected by hiatuses. The present study focuses on a representative deepening-upward sequence, spectacularly exposed in an abandoned bauxite quarry near Otranto: starting from continental facies (a several meters thick bauxitic paleosol on weathered Cretaceous limestone), the bedded succession passes towards an open-marine facies trough a ca. 14 m-thick sequence of alternating well-bedded marls, limestones, clays, paleosols, and lignites. Biostratigraphy and palaeoecology of the mollusc and foraminiferal assemblages sampled along the section are discussed. Their inferred age is Late Oligocene, possibly spanning the Oligo-Miocene boundary. Besides the lignite beds and paleosols, the deposits are referred to hypohaline swamps, oligo-mesohaline lagoons, and littoral marine environments. An additional significant Oligocene succession, of limited thickness, cropping out at Monte Vergine near Palmariggi, is discussed.
Chattian-?Miocene mollusc and foraminiferal assemblages from the vicinity of Otranto (Southern Apulia, Italy): a non-marine to marine transition / Esu, Daniela; Girotti, Odoardo; Pignatti, Johannes. - STAMPA. - 2:(2005), pp. 75-86.
Chattian-?Miocene mollusc and foraminiferal assemblages from the vicinity of Otranto (Southern Apulia, Italy): a non-marine to marine transition
ESU, Daniela;GIROTTI, Odoardo;PIGNATTI, Johannes
2005
Abstract
Carbonate platform deposits characterize the Salento peninsula (southernmost Apulia), which is part of the foreland of the Apenninic chain. The Meso-Cenozoic successions of this domain are discontinuous and affected by hiatuses. The present study focuses on a representative deepening-upward sequence, spectacularly exposed in an abandoned bauxite quarry near Otranto: starting from continental facies (a several meters thick bauxitic paleosol on weathered Cretaceous limestone), the bedded succession passes towards an open-marine facies trough a ca. 14 m-thick sequence of alternating well-bedded marls, limestones, clays, paleosols, and lignites. Biostratigraphy and palaeoecology of the mollusc and foraminiferal assemblages sampled along the section are discussed. Their inferred age is Late Oligocene, possibly spanning the Oligo-Miocene boundary. Besides the lignite beds and paleosols, the deposits are referred to hypohaline swamps, oligo-mesohaline lagoons, and littoral marine environments. An additional significant Oligocene succession, of limited thickness, cropping out at Monte Vergine near Palmariggi, is discussed.I documenti in IRIS sono protetti da copyright e tutti i diritti sono riservati, salvo diversa indicazione.