North Face Quartzite Fm
Type Locality and Naming
Arenaceous unit, North Face Quartzite (Bodenhausen et al., 1964; Bordet et al., 1967; Fuchs et al., 1988).
Synonym: Gyaru Fm (Bordet et al., 1975),
Lithology and Thickness
Sandstone containing calcareous mudrock intervals, followed in turn by calcschists yielding brachiopods and echinoderms still of Ordovician (Caradoc?) age ("calcschistes troués'' of Bordet et al., 1967; Colchen et al., 1986).
Relationships and Distribution
Lower contact
Overlies the Nilgiri Limestone Fm
Upper contact
Overlain by the Dark Band Fm (earliest Silurian)
Regional extent
Ordovician "Sedimentary derived conglomerates also occur further to the west in Kumaon, and are replaced by the North Face quartzose sandstones in the Nepal Himalaya."
GeoJSON
Fossils
Age
Depositional setting
Additional Information
"A major deformation phase associated with wide-spread granitoid intrusions around the Cambrian/Ordovician boundary. This event is well documented in the N.W. Himalaya (e.g. Garzanti et al., 1986; Grasemann et al., 1997) but less clearly in the central Himalaya, where it may correspond to the major mid- Ordovician turn from platform carbonate (Nilgri Limestone Fm) to siliciclastic sedimentation (North Face Quartzite Fm) but possibly even pre-date deposition of the Nilgiri Limestone."