Grand Canyon Series

Grand Canyon Series, major division of rocks in northern Arizona dating from Precambrian time (about 3.8 billion to 540 million years ago). The rocks of the Grand Canyon Series consist of about 3,400 m (about 10,600 feet) of quartz sandstones, shales, and thick sequences of carbonate rocks. Spectacular exposures of these rocks occur in the Grand Canyon of the Colorado River in northwestern Arizona, where they overlie the strongly deformed and contorted Vishnu Schist, the angularity of which stands in bold contrast to the almost horizontal bedding of the Grand Canyon Series. The Grand Canyon Series actually dips slightly eastward and is separated from the overlying Cambrian sandstones by a major erosion surface unconformity. A conglomerate was deposited on the eroded surface of the Vishnu Schist. Limestones, shales, and sandstones occur over the conglomerate and are thought to represent shallow water deposits. The area of deposition was probably a large deltaic region that was slowly subsiding, allowing great thicknesses of sediment to accumulate near sea level. The presence of Precambrian organisms is indicated by calcareous algaelike structures in the carbonate rocks, as well as by tracks and trails of wormlike creatures in other rocks. Initially, in a generalized outline of the Precambrian history of the region, the Vishnu Schist was upraised, folded, and metamorphosed and then slowly eroded and worn down to a flat surface. The Grand Canyon Series was deposited perhaps as part of a slowly subsiding geosynclinal trough. The region was then subjected to uplift and tilting, and a Precambrian period of erosion for the Grand Canyon Series began. This action was later followed by a long period of deposition during the Paleozoic Era (542 to 251 million years ago) and then further erosion during the Cenozoic Era (beginning 65.5 million years ago) until the region assumed its modern configuration.