The Precambrian foundation of southern Africa consists of Archaean cratonic nuclei surrounded by belts formed during three separate Proterozoic orogenic episodes. Crust that formed or was reworked at 2.05-1.8Ga is represented by orogenic belts (e.g. Kheis-Magondi, Ubendian-Usagaran) that partly wrap the ancient craton margins or form extensive basement in younger belts. Orogenic belts formed at 1.35-1.0Ga record arc magmatism and collisional events during assembly of the Rodinia supercontinent. The Namaqua-Natal Belt defines a major convergent plate boundary active at this time along the southern margin of the Archaean Kaapvaal Craton, and the western part of this belt is inferred to link with a largely buried, NE-trending orogen present in the Kalahari region. Orogenesis in the same time frame farther north is recorded by the Kibaran and Irumide Belts, which are separated by the Palaeoproterozoic Bangweulu Block but are inferred to have undergone a linked tectonic evolution. East of the Irumide Belt, extensive Mesoproterozoic arc crust occurs in Malawi and Mozambique, although strong Neoproterozoic overprinting of the arc rocks makes their original relations unclear. Breakup of Rodinia is signalled by widespread Neoproterozoic alkaline and bimodal magmatism associated with rift zones which, in some cases, evolved into major ocean basins. Subsequent amalgamation of Gondwana led to collisional orogenesis culminating at 575-505 Ma in the Mozambique and West Congo-Kaoko-Gariep-Saldania Belts along the present eastem and western margins of southern Africa. Coeval deformation in the interconnecting, transcontinental Damara-Lufilian-Zambezi Orogen may reflect destruction of linked rifts and narrow ocean basins driven by farfield stresses from the collisional plate margins.

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We show that intraplate magmatism occurred 1106 to 1112 million years ago over an area of two million square kilometers within the Kalahari craton of southern Africa, during the same magnetic polarity chron as voluminous magmatism within the cratonic core of North America. These contemporaneous magmatic events occurred while the Rodinia supercontinent was being assembled and are inferred to be parts of a single large igneous province emplaced across the two cratons. Widespread intraplate magmatism during Rodinia assembly shows that mantle upwellings required to generate such provinces may occur independently of the supercontinent cycle.

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