CATHODOLUMINESCENCE STUDIES AND U/PB DATING OF ZIRCONS IN PREMESOZOIC GNEISSES OF THE TAUERN WINDOW - IMPLICATIONS FOR THE PENNINIC BASEMENT EVOLUTION

The pre-Mesozoic basement in the eastern and central part of the Tauern Window (Eastern Alps) consists mainly of anatectic plagioclase gneisses and amphibolites intruded and migmatized by Carboniferous granitoids. The gneisses are geochemically similar to calcalkaline dacites of modern primitive island arcs. Cathodoluminescence investigations and U/Pb-data on zircons indicate an uppermost Proterozoic or Cambrian extrusion age of the dacitic protoliths and a Carboniferous syngranitoid anatexis around 320 Ma. High-K calcalkaline meta-rhyolites in the north central Tauern Window form a separate part of the basement not affected by Carboniferous anatexis and plutonism. Their protoliths extruded in the Lower Carboniferous. In the Permian, high-K granitoids intruded the anatectic basement. Results are consistent with an island-arc system evolving from a Late Proterozoic and Early Paleozoic primitive stage to a Lower Carboniferous mature stage represented by K-rich rhyolite volcanism. An Upper Carboniferous collisional event caused anatexis, affecting mainly the K-rich calcalkaline rocks. The last calcalkaline magmas intruded in a Permian post-collisional setting.