CHARACTERISTICS OF THE MEDITERRANEAN RANGES 



235 



But the Mediterranean orogen does 

 not stop at the Caspian Sea. The 

 trend-lines of the Cancasns are taken 

 up in the border ranges of Turkestan, 

 deflected northward through the arcs 

 bounding the Pamir plateau, contin- 

 ued eastward through the Kuenlun, 

 and turned to the south on the head- 

 waters of the Hoang-ho. A long belt 

 of chains follows the Mekong, crosses 

 Siam, and finally breaks off at the rias 

 coast of the Gulf of Siam. In this long 

 line of Asiatic chains there appears to 

 be universal overturning in the Alpine 

 sense — that is, generally northward. 

 Typical ^^decken^' structure is reported 

 from several localities. The southern 

 half of the Mediterranean orogen is 

 also traceable through Asia. From the 

 Taurus Mountains we pass into the 

 ranges of Kurdistan, western Persia, 

 and Oman, to the Arabian Sea. In 

 Baluchistan there is a northward curve 

 to join the great Himalayan arc, and 

 in upper Burma the trend-lines are 

 again southward, passing into Sunda 

 arc, which swings eastward to Timor. 

 In this long system of ranges there is 

 consistent overturning toward the 

 south, over Arabia, India, and the Aus- 

 tralian platform. In this entire Eura- 

 siatic mountain belt, extending from 

 Gibraltar to New Guinea, thousands of 

 miles in length and hundreds in width, 

 there is a remarkable correspondence 

 in kind and age of sedimentary rocks, 

 in kind and age of structure. Evi- 

 dently we are dealing with a great 

 structural unit, an orogenetic zone 

 which has been crushed between rigid 



