CAPARO, Formation

CAPARO, Formation

MIDDLE ORDOVICIAN

State of Mérida, Venezuela

Author of name: P. Christ, 1927.

Original reference: P. Christ, 1927, p. 404.

Original description: ibid. In 1927, Christ described the Caparo-Bellavista "series" (misspelled by him as Caparro-Bellavista) from the state of Mérida, which was separated by Küindig (1938, p. 28) into the Caparo and Bellavista "series". According to Kündig (1938, p. 28) and Liddle (1946, p. 106) the two "series" are separated by a small zone of La Quinta conglomerates evidently connected with a big strike fault. González de Juana (1951, p. 129) changed the name into Caparo formation. He describes the formation as consisting of clayey sandstones and red or mottled clays or shales. The classic exposure of middle Ordovician discovered by Christ is the most important one known in Venezuela.

Christ correctly assumed a lower Paleozoic age for his Caparo-Bellavista "series", but it remained for Terry in Schuchert (1935, p. 692-694) to discover identifiable fossils at the type locality which definitely established the age as middle Ordovician (see Liddle, 1946, p. 107).

Leith (1938, p. 337-344) identified: Dicranograptus caparroensis, Cryptolithus terryi, etc. Only the Caparo formation of the Caparo-Bellavista "series" of Christ is considered by Kündig to be dated by these fossils.

See also BELLAVISTA, Formation.

W. A. Mohler

BELLAVISTA, Formation

EOPALEOZOIC

State of Mérida, Venezuela

Author of name: P. Christ, 1927.

Original reference: P. Christ, 1927, p. 404.

Original description: ibid.

In 1927 Christ described the Caparo-Bellavista "series" which was separated by Kündig (1938, p. 24) into the Caparo and Bellavista "series". In the Spanish text of the same publication he refers to the latter as Bellavista formation. The Bellavista formation, according to Kündig, consists of: granite and lenses and dykes of non-metamorphic quartz porphyry. This series seems to represent a higher metamorphic facies type of the Mucuchachí group; however metamorphism never went so far as to produce micaschists. Similar types of metamorphic rocks occur in Táchira. They are important components of the Sierra Nevada massive of the Capaz and Avispa massives and show here all kinds of transition into mica-schists. The Caparo and Bellavista formations belong to two different units separated by a fault zone. The type locality is in the State of Mérida.