The Apulia Carbonate Platform

Carbonate platform

A carbonate platform is a sedimentary body which possesses topographic relief, and is composed of autochthonous calcareous deposits . Platform growth is mediated by sessile organisms whose skeletons build up the reef or by organisms which induce carbonate precipitation through their metabolism...

in Apulia

Apulia

Apulia is a region in Southern Italy bordering the Adriatic Sea in the east, the Ionian Sea to the southeast, and the Strait of Òtranto and Gulf of Taranto in the south. Its most southern portion, known as Salento peninsula, forms a high heel on the "boot" of Italy. The region comprises , and...

, Italy

Italy

Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

 was a major palaeogeographic

Palaeogeography

Palaeogeography is the study of what the geography was in times past. It is most often used about the physical landscape, although nothing excludes its use in reference to the human or cultural environment...

 element of the southern margin of the Mesozoic

Mesozoic

The Mesozoic era is an interval of geological time from about 250 million years ago to about 65 million years ago. It is often referred to as the age of reptiles because reptiles, namely dinosaurs, were the dominant terrestrial and marine vertebrates of the time...

 Tethys Ocean

Tethys Ocean

The Tethys Ocean was an ocean that existed between the continents of Gondwana and Laurasia during the Mesozoic era before the opening of the Indian Ocean.-Modern theory:...

. It is one of the so-called peri-Adriatic platforms, which are comparable to the Bahama Banks

Bahama Banks

The Bahama Banks are the submerged carbonate platforms that make up much of the Bahama Archipelago. The term is usually applied in referring to either the Great Bahama Bank around Andros Island, or the Little Bahama Bank of Grand Bahama Island and Great Abaco, which are the largest of the...

 in their carbonate facies

Facies

In geology, facies are a body of rock with specified characteristics. Ideally, a facies is a distinctive rock unit that forms under certain conditions of sedimentation, reflecting a particular process or environment....

, shape, size, and subsidence

Subsidence

Subsidence is the motion of a surface as it shifts downward relative to a datum such as sea-level. The opposite of subsidence is uplift, which results in an increase in elevation...

 rate and, also, in the internal architecture.

The Apulia Platform, which is part of the stable and relatively undeformed foreland of the Apennine

Apennine mountains

The Apennines or Apennine Mountains or Greek oros but just as often used alone as a noun. The ancient Greeks and Romans typically but not always used "mountain" in the singular to mean one or a range; thus, "the Apennine mountain" refers to the entire chain and is translated "the Apennine...

 thrust belt

Thrust fault

A thrust fault is a type of fault, or break in the Earth's crust across which there has been relative movement, in which rocks of lower stratigraphic position are pushed up and over higher strata. They are often recognized because they place older rocks above younger...

, is bounded on both sides by basinal deposits; westward the margin is buried under the Apennine thrust sheets, to the east the adjacent paleogeographic domains are the vast Ionian

Ionian Sea

The Ionian Sea , is an arm of the Mediterranean Sea, south of the Adriatic Sea. It is bounded by southern Italy including Calabria, Sicily and the Salento peninsula to the west, southern Albania to the north, and a large number of Greek islands, including Corfu, Zante, Kephalonia, Ithaka, and...

 Basin to the south and the Umbria

Umbria

Umbria is a region of modern central Italy. It is one of the smallest Italian regions and the only peninsular region that is landlocked.Its capital is Perugia.Assisi and Norcia are historical towns associated with St. Francis of Assisi, and St...

-Marche

Marche

The population density in the region is below the national average. In 2008, it was 161.5 inhabitants per km2, compared to the national figure of 198.8. It is highest in the province of Ancona , and lowest in the province of Macerata...

 Basin to the north. To the west, the Apulia Platform plunges downfaulted underneath the terrigenous

Terrigenous

In oceanography, terrigenous sediments are those derived from the erosion of rocks on land; that is, that are derived from terrestrial environments. Consisting of sand, mud, and silt carried to sea by rivers, their composition is usually related to their source rocks; deposition of these sediments...

 sediments of the Apennine foredeep; to the southeast, the Jurassic

Jurassic

The Jurassic is a geologic period and system that extends from about Mya to  Mya, that is, from the end of the Triassic to the beginning of the Cretaceous. The Jurassic constitutes the middle period of the Mesozoic era, also known as the age of reptiles. The start of the period is marked by...

–Early Cretaceous

Early Cretaceous

The Early Cretaceous or the Lower Cretaceous , is the earlier or lower of the two major divisions of the Cretaceous...

 margin lies 20–30 km offshore from the present Apulia coastline.

Gargano Promontory

The Gargano

Gargano

Gargano is a historical and geographical Italian sub-region situated in Apulia, consisting of a wide isolated mountain massif made of highland and several peaks and forming the backbone of the Gargano Promontory projecting into the Adriatic Sea. The high point is Monte Calvo at . Most of the upland...

 Promontory is an area of the Apulia Platform. The Gargano Promontory and the Maiella Mountain, which now is part of the external Apennine thrust belt, are the only areas where the transition from platform facies to basin facies is exposed on land. In the Gargano area this transition has been investigated extensively in the last decade. Since the mid-1960s AGIP

Agip

Agip is an Italian automotive gasoline and diesel retailer established in 1926. It is a subsidiary of the multinational petroleum company Eni.In 2003, Eni S.p.A...

 geologists and the Italian Geological Survey recognized that the western part of the promontory is part of the shallow-water Apulia Platform, whereas the eastern part is characterized by slope and basinal deposits.

The backbone of the Gargano Promontory consists of a thick pile (3000–3500 m) of Jurassic and Cretaceous shallow-water carbonates. A small outcrop of Upper Triassic evaporite

Evaporite

Evaporite is a name for a water-soluble mineral sediment that result from concentration and crystallization by evaporation from an aqueous solution. There are two types of evaporate deposits, marine which can also be described as ocean deposits, and non-marine which are found in standing bodies of...

 (Anidriti di Burano

Burano

Burano is an island in the Venetian Lagoon, northern Italy; like Venice itself, it could more correctly be called an archipelago of four islands linked by bridges...

) and black limestone

Limestone

Limestone is a sedimentary rock composed largely of the minerals calcite and aragonite, which are different crystal forms of calcium carbonate . Many limestones are composed from skeletal fragments of marine organisms such as coral or foraminifera....

 is present on the northern seashore (Punta delle Pietre Nere). These rocks have been encountered also by wells Gargano-1 (G.1 - Conoco) and Foresta Umbra-1 (F.U. - AGIP). The outcropping succession comprises Upper Jurassic to Eocene

Eocene

The Eocene Epoch, lasting from about 56 to 34 million years ago , is a major division of the geologic timescale and the second epoch of the Paleogene Period in the Cenozoic Era. The Eocene spans the time from the end of the Palaeocene Epoch to the beginning of the Oligocene Epoch. The start of the...

 carbonate rocks representing platform-to-basin settings. Minor scattered outcrops of Miocene

Miocene

The Miocene is a geological epoch of the Neogene Period and extends from about . The Miocene was named by Sir Charles Lyell. Its name comes from the Greek words and and means "less recent" because it has 18% fewer modern sea invertebrates than the Pliocene. The Miocene follows the Oligocene...

 sediments, unconformably overlying the Cretaceous and Jurassic platform, are present in many parts of the promontory, mainly along the lowland border zones (Cagnano Varano

Cagnano Varano

Cagnano Varano is a town and comune in the province of Foggia in the Apulia region of southeast Italy]....

, Sannicandro

Sannicandro di Bari

Sannicandro di Bari is a town and comune in the province of Bari, Puglia, Italy.-Main sights:The main attraction of Sannicandro is the Hohenstaufen-Norman castle, located in the centre of the city. It is composed of two structures one within the other: the first one was built by the Byzantines in...

, Apricena

Apricena

Apricena is an Apulian town in the province of Foggia. It is 42 km away from its provincial capital, Foggia, Italy, from Foggia.This territory is mainly plain, cultivated with olives, cereals and wine...

, Manfredonia

Manfredonia

Manfredonia is a town and comune of Puglia, Italy, in the province of Foggia, from which it is 35 kilometres northeast by rail. Manfredonia is situated on the coast, facing east, to the south of Monte Gargano, and giving its name to the gulf to the east of it...

), and also one site inland near San Giovanni Rotondo

San Giovanni Rotondo

San Giovanni Rotondo is the name of a city and comune in the province of Foggia, Puglia region, southern Italy. As of 2006 it had a population of 26,442....

.

On the basis of physical stratigraphic relationships and of the presence of evident bounding surfaces, the Jurassic-Eocene succession can be subdivided into six major packages of sediments, which can be classified as second-order depositional sequences.
The lower three sequences (Callovian

Callovian

In the geologic timescale, the Callovian is an age or stage in the Middle Jurassic, lasting between 164.7 ± 4.0 Ma and 161.2 ± 4.0 Ma. It is the last stage of the Middle Jurassic, following the Bathonian and preceding the Oxfordian....

 to Albian

Albian

The Albian is both an age of the geologic timescale and a stage in the stratigraphic column. It is the youngest or uppermost subdivision of the Early/Lower Cretaceous epoch/series. Its approximate time range is 112.0 ± 1.0 Ma to 99.6 ± 0.9 Ma...

) are represented by the entire spectrum of sediments from platform to slope and basin, and the younger ones (Cenomanian

Cenomanian

The Cenomanian is, in the ICS' geological timescale the oldest or earliest age of the Late Cretaceous epoch or the lowest stage of the Upper Cretaceous series. An age is a unit of geochronology: it is a unit of time; the stage is a unit in the stratigraphic column deposited during the corresponding...

 to Lutetian

Lutetian

The Lutetian is, in the geologic timescale, a stage or age in the Eocene. It spans the time between and . The Lutetian is preceded by the Ypresian and is followed by the Bartonian. Together with the Bartonian it is sometimes referred to as the Middle Eocene subepoch...

) largely by slope and basin deposits.

Probably the most typical and significant feature of the Gargano slope and basin setting is the presence of huge megabreccia

Breccia

Breccia is a rock composed of broken fragments of minerals or rock cemented together by a fine-grained matrix, that can be either similar to or different from the composition of the fragments....

bodies which, in terms of sequence stratigraphic terminology, can be interpreted as typical lowstand wedges.