Abstract
The Bushveld Complex of South Africa is a large layered intrusive suite of cumulate rocks for which the parental magma is not directly obtainable. However, we report here indirect evidence from a suite of fine-grained sills in the sediments below the Bushveld Complex. Mineralogical, geochemical and experimental petrological data are consistent with their being representative of the parental magma. They are siliceous picrites (SiO2 = ∼55%; MgO = ∼12%), high in Cr, Ni, Rb and K, and with a high initial Sr87/Sr86 ratio, and hence represent a rather unusual magma composition. Crustal contamination may have been important in their evolution.
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Davies, G., Cawthorn, R., Barton, J. et al. Parental magma to the Bushveld Complex. Nature 287, 33–35 (1980). https://doi.org/10.1038/287033a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/287033a0
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