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Structural and
Stratigraphic Elements
The generalized geologic map of Cuba (Figure 54) middle Eocene are present in a stack of folded and
shows that the island is segmented into eight gen faulted thrusts sheets (nappes) dipping generally
eral areas of pre-upper Eocene outcrops surrounded to the north. The direction of thrusting is believed
by relatively undisturbed later Tertiary sediments. Al to be northward. Along the north coast, near Bahia
though there are similarities between them, each area Honda, ultrabasics and Cretaceous volcanics are
has its own stratigraphic and structural characteristics. present. The general strike is northeast. This area
From northeast to southwest, these areas can generally extends into the western Habana Province.
be grouped as follows: (1) north-central sedimentary 2) Isla de la Juventud area. This consists mostly of a
terranes: from northern Las Villas to northern Oriente; core of relatively low grade, but intensely deformed
(2) basic igneous-volcanic terranes: from northern metamorphics of Middle to Upper Jurassic and pos
Pinar del Rio to eastern Oriente; and (c) southwestern sible Cretaceous age, similar to the older part of the
sedimentary terranes: from Pinar del Rio and Isla de section in Pinar Del Rio. This core has the general
la Juventud to southeastern Oriente. structure of a dome with the lower metamorphic
These areas are complexly deformed structurally grades in the center. In contact with the metamor
and are present-day topographic highs. They are sur phics, unmetamorphosed Cretaceous volcanics
rounded by a relatively thin and much less disturbed outcrop in the northwestern part of the island.
cover of sediments ranging in age from late lower Eo
cene to Pleistocene. These areas are large-scale, mostly
post-Eocene, uplifts. Central Cuba
77
78 / Pardo
numerous facies of Upper Jurassic to lower–middle Rio section. The Escambray massif consists of two
Eocene sediments are present. However, although nearly circular domes and, as in the Isle of Pines,
the area is highly fragmented by vertical faults and the metamorphic grade is lowest in their cores.
is complexly folded, the general appearance is that The Las Villas–northwestern Camaguey area has
of several long (more than 100 km [62 mi]) south- the most complete sequences of sedimentary, vol
dipping belts. The carbonate sediments are gener canic, and igneous rocks occurring in the greatest
ally found to the northeast, the ultrabasic igneous variety of observable relationships on the island.
in the middle, and the Cretaceous volcanics and For this reason, it is used here as a type geologic
volcaniclastics in the southwest. The northern province and is the basis for many interpretations
most exposed belt, the Yaguajay belt, shows mas that will be extended to other parts of the island.
sive carbonates similar to, and of the same order 3) Central Camaguey area. This area is similar to the
of thickness, as the Florida – Bahamas banks. The Las Villas – northwestern Camaguey area; how
degree of deformation is most intense in the mid ever, with the exception of the extensive Creta
dle, mostly ultrabasic, area, between the carbon ceous massive carbonate exposures of the Sierra
ates to the north and the volcanics to the south. de Cubitas and a few scattered outcrops of sedi
The general strike is northwest. Near the south mentary facies, most of it is covered by ultrabasic
coast of Cuba is the massif of Escambray, which and other igneous and Cretaceous volcanics in
consists of an igneous complex and variously meta truded by large bodies of granodiorite. A steep
morphosed, generally low-grade, Jurassic and Cre southwestern dip exists, and the general strike is
taceous sediments very similar to the Pinar Del northwest.
Structural and Stratigraphic Elements / 79
Unfortunately, much other information follows Soviet- lines of stratigraphic nomenclature (Hedberg, 1976;
era practice of naming rocks by age and interpretive Salvador, 1994).
basin classification, such as ‘‘Cretaceous parautoch
thonous miogeosynclinal,’’ which makes correlation The Belt Nomenclature Problem
with simple lithostratigraphic units difficult. In a few Several important related terms have been widely
cases, the Cuban published information appears used in Cuba throughout the last 39 yr. These are belts,
erroneous when compared to the solidly established facies-structural zones, structurofacies zones, zones,
pre-1960 data. Therefore, some of the recent informa tectonostratigraphic units, tectonic units, tecto-units,
tion, when added to the natural geological complex etc. The fact that in central Cuba, the names of these
ities, increases the problems of interpretation. so-called units, zones, or belts have been freely inter
It has to be mentioned that the Mapa Geologico de changed by different authors increases the confusion
la Republica de Cuba (Pushcharovsky et al., 1988), on considerably. For instance, the Las Villas unit of Hatten
data collected up to November 1, 1985, is the best is approximately Pardo’s Cifuentes and Placetas belts,
overall published source of information available yet. whereas Pardo’s Las Villas and Sagua la Chica belts
Another excellent publication is the Mapa Tectonico de are (more or less) Hatten’s Zulueta unit; Ducloz’s Re
Cuba (Pushcharovsky et al., 1989). medios zone is Pardo’s Yaguajay, Jatibonico, and Cayo
Coco belts or Hatten’s Remedios and Cayo Coco
Gulf’s Stratigraphic Nomenclature units; and so forth. Figure 55 is a chart showing the
When Cuban Gulf Oil initiated systematic geo terms that have been most commonly used in central
logic mapping of central Cuba in 1951 at the scale of Cuba. What follows is an attempt to explain the or
1:40,000, the confusion over preexisting terminology igin and the reason for such terminology and the en
was such that it was decided to establish a framework suing confusion.
of stratigraphic units as if the geology of the island Although the complexity of the pre-Tertiary geol
was totally unknown. Conventional rules of strati ogy of Cuba has long been known (DeGolyer, 1918),
graphic nomenclature were strictly adhered to; any Rutten, in 1936, recognized that, broadly speaking, the
association of rocks with characteristic and recog Las Villas Province could be divided into two terranes:
nizable lithologic features were given a formation limestone to the north and igneous-volcanic to the
name. The age was determined through fossils or south. In 1937, a Cuban geologist, Ortega y Ros,
stratigraphic relationships and had no effect on the properly identified, described, and named many of the
lithostratigraphic terminology. Jurassic, Cretaceous, and Paleogene stratigraphic units
The number of formations thus described by the of central Cuba. Unfortunately, his work appeared in
Cuban Gulf Oil was quite large, on the order of 125 an obscure publication and remained unnoticed until
for the pre-upper Eocene in central Cuba. With the the middle 1950s.
extreme structural complexities, many groups of out By the late 1940s, the two-terrane scheme had been
crops had recognizable characteristics, but were to further refined by various geologists, and the standard
tally disconnected from each other, so that their subdivisions of central Cuba became massive Reme
relationships could not easily be determined in the dios carbonates to the north, serpentine and Tuff series
field. In addition, to avoid misgrouping, it was deemed to the south, and the radiolarian-rich, thin-bedded,
necessary to separate related lithologies that, under siliceous Aptychus Limestone in between.
less extreme circumstances, might have been given As Cuban Gulf Oil initiated the geologic mapping
a member rank and grouped under one formation that began with the pre-upper Eocene of central Cuba,
name. it became apparent that certain areas were charac
In addition, the extreme structural shortening jux terized by successions and associations of lithologies
taposes many lithologies that normally would be quite different from those in adjoining areas, although
spread across a large area. It can be said that the large the ages represented were similar. Because these areas
number of recognizable lithologic units across such a tended to be elongated along the strike, they were
relatively small area is a measure of the magnitude named ‘‘belts.’’ They were strictly informal operation
of the telescoping of the basin. It should be empha al subdivisions. In 1953, Pardo (Cuban Gulf’s Mem
sized that many of the stratigraphic units that have orandum 92, p. 4) wrote the following:
been published in the recent literature, notably in
Pinar Del Rio and in the metamorphic massifs, are Northern Las Villas and northwestern Camaguey
well defined and follow accepted international guide can be subdivided in several parallel northwest,
Structural and Stratigraphic Elements / 81
southeast trending belts. Each one of these is sides by a tectonic feature (such as a fault system),
characterized by its structure and stratigraphy. . . and characterized by unique petrology. A tecto
unit generally parallels regional stratigraphic
In 1954, Pardo (p. 5) modified this definition as strike. The characteristic of the petrology and
follows (the definition was published for the first time stratigraphy in each tecto-unit are distinct. . .
in Pardo, 1975, p. 561):
The concept of belts exposed in G. Pardo mem As can be seen, the differences between the Gulf
orandum no. 92 (1953) has remained essentially and California Co. definitions are not major, but there
unchanged; however, due to the complexity of were strong differences of opinion relative to the as
the tectonics, many of the belts cannot be geo signment of some rocks to equivalent belts (units).
graphically separated onto continuous areas. In 1960, the files of all foreign oil companies were
They are in many instances scattered in small confiscated by the revolutionary government, and
patches following certain general trends. There the above concepts became public knowledge in the
fore, for many of the belts, it is impossible to geologic circles of Cuba and of the assisting Soviet
define them as a geographic unit such as the Ya block countries; however, they remained virtually un
guajay or Las Villas belts (which are continuous), known in the west, where essentially nothing was
and one has to recur to a stratigraphic definition published until the late 1960s to mid-1970s. Mean
of the belt; that is, a belt will be defined as an while, in Cuba, the application of these definitions,
association of several lithologies that occur invari with varying degrees of understanding, resulted in
ably together. This definition can be carried even confusion. For example, Dilla and Garcia (1984, 1985)
further in a paleogeographic and paleotectonic reshuffled the existing terminology and split the ex
sense: every part of a belt will have had an iden isting zones, units, etc., between the Cretaceous and
tical succession of tectonic, sedimentary and ig the Paleocene. They created two new zones (Sagua and
neous events during geologic time. Cabaiguan) that they thought contained only flysch
sediments superimposed on the older rocks of all other
It turned out that some belts have characteristic zones. This reduced the usefulness of previously rec
internal structure. Lithologic associations are com ognized zones, units, and belts, and using names that
monly bounded by faults, but they also grade into had been previously published added to the existing
one another (or at least are not separated from each confusion. Besides, their assumption that flysch sedi
other by obvious major faults), making the assign mentation always and only occurred from the Paleo
ment of lithologies to belts difficult (facies do even cene to the middle Eocene is surely not correct.
tually change). In Cuba, faults are everywhere, and In Pushcharovsky et al. (1988), these belts, units,
they can be strongly deformed, so their importance is zones, etc., are referred to as ‘‘zonas estructurofaciales’’
difficult to judge from field mapping alone. The dis or structurofacies zones.
parity between two adjacent belts was used to de
termine the probable magnitude of a fault and not
the magnitude of the fault to define the belt. In ad General Remarks
dition, the boundary faults are commonly imbricated The Gulf data set forms a coherent package, with
with components of the two adjacent belts repeated well-established stratigraphic definitions now in the
several times. public domain, and its nomenclature is used as a back
The California Company (Chevron) initiated re bone for this publication. A significant reason to do
connaissance work in 1951 and, in 1957, began their so is that the author of this publication knows pre
systematic mapping of central Cuba. Of course, they cisely the meaning of the Gulf names whereas much
had no access to Gulf reports and, in 1957, formalized of what has been published later has ambiguous defi
a classification scheme, like Gulf’s belts, called ‘‘tecto nitions. As will be seen, many Gulf names have been
units,’’ but differing from Gulf’s by being slanted more incorporated in today’s official nomenclature or pub
heavily toward the present structure instead of stra lished literature, but are not so credited. In some cases,
tigraphy. In 1957, in a private California Company credit is given to the author of the Gulf name, i.e.,
report, Meyerhoff and Hatten wrote the following: Wassall, Truitt, etc., who were Gulf employees, but in
terestingly enough, Gulf is never recognized; nor is any
A tecto-unit is defined as a large and essentially other capitalist organization for that matter. As a re
discrete structural unit, bounded on its two long sult, it is not always known whether the presently
Structural and Stratigraphic Elements / 83
used Gulf names are the result of a coincidence (i.e., guey, and Oriente, the published names will be used,
same type locality), or whether they found their way and an attempt will be made to correlate them with
into the terminology from Gulf’s early reports and Gulf’s data when pertinent. An attempt will be made
were sometimes given a somewhat different conno to always give credit where it is due, but this some
tation. This is also true of the work of other companies times will be impossible, considering the large vol
such as Chevron, Shell, etc. ume of unpublished material that is being consulted
However, credit should be given to many Cuban (Gulf’s and others). However, the primary purpose of
and Eastern European workers who made definite this chapter is to give information about Cuba and
efforts to identify the original author of many strat not to describe all the arguments that have ensued
igraphic units. If the political situation had been dif ever since the second geologist visited the island.
ferent, much confusion would have been avoided. No The Geologic Map of Cuba, scale 1:250,000, (Push
attempt will be made to identify the author of Gulf’s charovsky et al., 1988), and the Tectonic Map of Cuba,
terminology. It was a cooperative effort involving P. scale 1:500,000, (Pushcharovsky et al., 1989), published
Bronnimann, G. Pardo, P. B. Truitt, and H. Wassall. jointly by the Academy of Sciences of Cuba and the
Truitt and Wassall conducted most of the fieldwork Academy of Sciences of the former Soviet Union will
and were the originators of much of the terminology be extensively used to provide uniformity in discuss
(full references can be found in the University of Texas ing the entire island.
copies of Gulf’s reports). To assist the reader, a table has been prepared (the
In some cases, Gulf used already existing names Localities section of this publication) where the ap
and applied a precise definition that might not have proximate location of geographic localities mentioned
been followed by other authors. In this publication, in the text is given, using the 10 x 10-km (6 x 6-mi)
all the names defined and used by Gulf will be fol grid system on the 1988 geologic map (Pushcharovsky
lowed by an asterisk (*), for example, to differentiate et al., 1988). This grid has an arbitrary origin west and
the Vega* Formation as defined by Gulf from the Vega south of Cuba, and the grid number refers to 10,000 m
Formation as used in Pushcharovsky et al. (1988), or (33,000 ft); for instance, 33N means 330,000 m
Gulf’s Las Villas* belt from Hatten et al.’s Las Villas (1,082,677 ft) north of the origin. It should be noted
unit. It is hoped that in this manner, confusion will be that the southern part of Oriente has a different origin
avoided. At any rate, these homonyms will be clari than most of the island (the usual problem of trying
fied in the text. There certainly will be some depar to fit a square grid over a sphere). In the Localities
tures from original definitions and interpretations section of this publication, the southwestern corner
because of new information such as age dating, pub of the quadrangle in which the locality is situated
lished studies on the metamorphics, deep drilling, new will be identified in the following manner: The lo
geologic concepts, etc. cality name will be followed by [sheet number — grid
Of course, in areas where other sources give more north — grid east]. For instance: Quemado de Guines
complete information, such as Pinar Del Rio, Cama anticlinorium [12-33-37].