The Paikon massif revisited, comments on the late Cretaceous - Paleogene geodynamics of the Axios-Vardar zone. How many Jurassic ophiolitic basins? (Hellenides, Macedonia, Greece)

In the Axios-Vardar zone, the Paikon massif has been revisited. To the west, it is composed of a pile-up of SW dipping slices. These have been thrust toward the NNE while the Almopias zone was folding with a SSW vergence. Subsequently thrusting with a SW vergence occurred on the eastern flank of the Paikon massif and in the Almopias zone. These tectonic events took place during the Paleocene - early Eocene and during the upper Eocene - lower Oligocene respectively. During the late Cretaceous, the Almopias zone was a trough whose floor was a late Jurassic ophiolitic sheet. It was located between the Paikon carbonate platform and the Pelagonian platform. This analysis leads to the conclusion that the ophiolites were already located in the Almopias zone before the late Cretaceous and even before the upper Jurassic-lower Cretaceous. It is concluded that during the Jurassic the Almopias zone was an oceanic crust basin, the Paikon zone an island arc and the Peonias zone a back-arc basin. This analysis is a first step which is necessary to precise the geodynamic significance of the Axios- Vardar zone as a whole during the Triassic - Jurassic taking into account the stratigraphie, paleogeographic and structural data and the location in space and time of the magmatic and metamorphic belts