Taconic orogeny Taconic orogeny The Taconic orogeny was a mountain building period that ended 440 million years ago and affected most of modern-day New England. A great mountain chain formed from eastern Canada down through what is now the Piedmont of the East coast of the United States. As the mountain chain eroded in the Silurian and Devonian periods, sediments from the mountain chain spread throughout the present-day Appalachians and midcontinental North America. Beginning in Cambrian time, about 550 million years ago, the Iapetus Ocean began to close. The weight of accumulating sediments, in addition to compressional forces in the crust, forced
Pampean orogeny monzogranites, and volcanic rocks, all of them of calc-alkaline chemistry. The igneous rocks of this belt formed at various times in over the period from 555 to 525 million years ago. From 525 million years ago onward another magmatic belt of peralumineous and mafic rocks developed further amidst gneiss, schist, amphibolites and carbonate rocks. The igneous rocks of this belt formed in the period from 525 to 515 million years ago. The Pampean orogeny can be considered part of the larger Terra Australis orogeny or of the Brasiliano orogeny. The Pampean orogeny developed at a similar time as the Paraguai