Variscan orogeny rifted off the north Gondwana margin in early Ordovician. By the end of the Silurian and in Early Devonian times, Baltica and Laurentia drifted towards each other, closing the Iapetus Ocean between them. They collided in the Caledonian orogeny and formed the Caledonide mountains of North America, Greenland, the British Isles and Norway. Seafloor spreading to the south of Avalonia pushed the latter into north Laurentia and thrust up the northern Appalachian Mountains in the acadian phase of the Caledonian orogeny. Contemporaneously the Tornquist Sea between Avalonia and Baltica was entirely closed. Thus Avalonia formed the southern coast of the
Sunsás orogeny Sunsás orogeny The Sunsás orogeny was an ancient orogeny active during the Late Paleoproterozoic and Mesoproterozoic and currently preserved as the Sunsás orogen in the Amazonian Craton in South America. About 85% of the belt is covered by Phanerozoic sediments. Among the remaining 15% of the orogen exposed at surface the best outcrops lies around the Bolivia-Brazil border. It is thought that the original orogen once spanned an area from Venezuela to Argentina and Paraguay. The western and southeastern fringes of the Sunsás orogen have been incorporated into the Andean orogeny and the Brasiliano orogeny respectively. The Sunsás orogeny was