Abstract
The study of the Careón ophiolite has supplied with data concerning the characteristics of a Paleozoic oceanic lithosphere and the earliest subduction-related variscan events. The ophiolite, of Lower Devonian age, consists of a serpentinized harzburgite and dunite lower section and of a crustal section made up of coarse-grained gabbros. Both sections were intruded by a large number of dikes. Convergence processes took place shortly afterward oceanic crust generation, giving rise to a mantle-rooted synthetic thrust system. The exhumation of the ophiolite occurred by continuous development of extensional detachments in the upper part of the accretionary wedge coeval with underthrusting of the continental margin of Gondwana.
