Steep crustal-scale faults, having their origins in the Late Archean and Early Proterozoic and trending NE-SW, which define the fundamental block lithospheric structure of the North American craton, are seen from geological and geophysical evidence to continue far into the interior of the Late Proterozoic-Phanerozoic Canadian Cordilleran mobile megabelt. This suggests that variously reworked ex-cratonic basement blocks underlie much of the Cordillera. The western edge of the modern craton is probably near the Rocky Mountain-Omineca belt boundary; the Rocky Mountain fold-and-thrust belt on the east side of the Cordillera is evidently rootless and overlies the undisturbed cratonic basement. Phanerozoic differences between the Cordilleran tectonic belts, resulting from a long, dissimilar, multi-cycle history of waxing and waning orogenesis apparent from the rock record, lie chiefly in the degree of indigenous tectonic remobilization and reworking of the ancient crust.

Includes supplementary material: sn.pub/extras

Inhalt
Governing principles in regional tectonic evolution.- Rock units in regional tectonic analysis.- Conceptual fundamentals of regional tectonic analysis on continents.- View of the cordilleran mobile megabelts evolution from the craton.- Omineca orogenic belt as tectonotype of the Eastern Cordilleran miogeosyncline.- Broad look at geodynamial mechanisms of crustal restructuring in the Cordilleran orogens and median massifs.- Lessons from Cordilleran geology for the methodology of regional tectonic analysis of mobile megabelts.- Practical utility of rock evidence and geophysical studies in restoring regional tectonic history in mobile megabelts.