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Chisapani Quartzite Formation
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Chisapani Quartzite Fm base reconstruction

Chisapani Quartzite Fm

Period: 
Ordovician

Age Interval: 
late Ordovician


Province: 
Nepal Lesser Himalaya

Type Locality and Naming

Katmandu region (Tethyan sequence)


Lithology and Thickness

"The Chisapani Quartzite serves as a light-colored marker band, separating the underlying much darker schists and quartzites of the underlying Kalitar Fm from the overlying Kulikhani Fm schist. The Chisapani Quartzite represents a conspicuous, very fine-grained, white to pale green, clean variety of quartzite with sericite partings or thin sericite–phyllite seams. It is bedded into decimetric bands, displaying frequent cross-lamination and occasional ripple marks. The upper bands of the Chisapani Quartzite are relatively thin-bedded. This formation is about 400–500 m thick at its type locality."


Lithology Pattern: 
Fine-grained sandstone


Relationships and Distribution

Lower contact

Probably a major disconformity (most of Cambrian and Ordovician absent) of the underlying Kalitar Fm (early Cambrian) to the Chisapani Quartzite Fm of late Ordovician age according to schematic correlation diagram of Martin (2017) to Tethyan Himalayan succession. However, another view (Dhital, 2015) is that "The Kalitar Fm is succeeded transitionally by the Chisapani Quartzite."

Upper contact

The contact with the succeeding Kulikhani Fm is a rapid transition.

Regional extent


GeoJSON

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Fossils


Age 


Age Span: 

    Beginning stage: 
Sandbian

    Fraction up in beginning stage: 
0.0

    Beginning date (Ma): 
458.18

    Ending stage: 
Sandbian

    Fraction up in the ending stage: 
0.15

    Ending date (Ma):  
457.36

Depositional setting


Depositional pattern:  


Additional Information


Compiler:  

Descriptions from Megh Raj Dhital (2015, Geology of Nepal: Regional Perspective of the Classic Collided Orogen, Springer Publ., 499 pp.). Age spans estimated from correlation diagrams in Martin, A.J. (2017, "A review of Himalayan stratigraphy, magmatism, and structure", Gondwana Research, 49: 42-80; http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.gr.2017.04.031), but these are often controversial.