Pre-Alpine prograde evolution of the Upper Alpujarride (Betic-Rif belt) reveals a Paleotethys-related collision

Medium and high grade kyanite-bearing graphitic metapelites of the basement of the Torrox Unit (Upper Alpujarride, Western Mediterranean) show kyanite-andalusite-kyanite replacements and coexisting garnet types with complex compositional zoning and growth-dissolution stages. This allows inferring two clockwise <i>P-T</i> paths associated with contrasted orogenic cycles of latest Carboniferous – earliest Permian and Eocene(?)-Miocene age, respectively. Dated (306 ± 77 Ma) prograde medium grade garnet cores with relatively low to moderate Ca content indicates pre-Alpine barrovian metamorphism in the kyanite stability field (<i>ca</i>. 600°C, 0.7–0.8 GPa). This implies a prograde pressurization of the sequence followed by decompression, as inferred from andalusite replacements after kyanite. Deeper in the sequence, anatectic granitic orthogneisses contain high-grade graphitic kyanite-bearing metapelitic restitic enclaves. Dating of rutile (with inclusions of kyanite) and monazite (shielded in biotite) from the pelitic enclaves provided pre-Alpine ages (<i>ca</i>. 300 Ma) rejuvenated due to Alpine overprint. Such pressurization event is not consistent with a late Variscan stage, commonly identified with a tectonic scenario characterized by orogenic collapse and decompression at ca. 300 Ma. Instead, we propose a post-Variscan collision event related to the closure of the western Paleotethys. On the other hand, Ca-rich cores of garnet porphyroblasts in the medium-grade metapelites formed at 1.1–1.2 GPa, 500°C, implying a metamorphic gradient of ca. 11.5°C/km related to Eocene (?) subduction. Kyanite+phengite replacements after andalusite are related to this stage. Late Mg-rich Ca-poorer overgrowths in garnet porphyroblasts document increasing temperature during the first stage of decompression (down to 0.9 GPa at ca. 650°C) with increasing thermal gradient up to ca. 20°C/km. These two complete metamorphic cycles of pressurization and heating followed by decompression allow reconciling previous contradictory conclusions about the paragenetic and thermal gradient development during the Paleotethyan and Alpine cycles in different units of the Betic-Rif belt.