Post-Collisional Tectonomagmatic Evolution, Crustal Reworking and Ore Genesis along a Section of the Southern Variscan Belt: The Variscan Mineral System of Sardinia (Italy)

Since the early Paleozoic, numerous metallogenic events produced in the Sardinian massif a singular concentration of mineral deposits of various kinds. Among them, the Variscan metallogenic peak represents a late Paleozoic phase of diffuse ore formation linked to the tectonomagmatic evolution of the Variscan chain. Two main classes of ores may primarily be attributed to this peak: (1) mesothermal orogenic-type As-Au ± W ± Sb ores, only found in E Sardinia, and (2) intrusion-related Sn-W-Mo-F and base metals-bearing ores found in the whole Sardinian Batholith, but mainly occurring in central–south Sardinia. Both deposit classes formed diachronously during the Variscan post-compressional extension. The orogenic-type ores are related to regional-scale flows of mineralizing fluids, and the intrusion-related ores occur around fertile intrusions of different granite suites. Metallogenic reconstructions suggest almost entirely crustal processes of mineralization without a significant contribution from the mantle. We summarized these processes with a holistic approach and conceptualized the Sardinian Variscan Mineral System (SVMS), a crustal-scale physical system of ore mineralization in the Sardinian basement. The SVMS required suitable metal sources in the crust and diffuse crustal reworking triggered by heat that allowed (a) the redistribution of the original metal budget of the crust in magmas by partial melting and (b) the production of metal-bearing fluids by metamorphic dehydration. Heat transfer in the Sardinian Variscan crust involved shear heating in lithospheric shear zones and the role of mantle uplift as a thermal engine in an extensional tectonic setting. Lithospheric shear zones acted as effective pathways in focusing fluid flow through a large-scale plumbing system into regional-scale structural traps for ores. Pre-Variscan metal sources of metallogenic relevance may have been (1) the magmatic arc and magmatic arc-derived materials of Ordovician age, extensively documented in E Sardinia crust, and (2) an inferred Precambrian crystalline basement lying under the Phanerozoic crustal section, whose presence has been assumed from geophysical data and from petrological and geochemical characteristics of granite suites. At shallower crustal levels, important contributions of metals may have come from pre-Variscan ore sources, such as the Pb-Zn MVT Cambrian ores of SW Sardinia or the REE-bearing Upper Ordovician paleoplacers of E Sardinia.