Many granitic intrusions display evidence of magma mixing processes. The interaction of melts of contrasting composition may play a significant role during their generation and evolution. The Strzegom-Sobótka massif (SSM), located in the Sudetes (SW Poland) in the north-eastern part of the Bohemian Massif of the Central European Variscides, exhibits significant evidence of magma mingling on the macro- and micro-scales. The massif is a composite intrusion, with four main varieties: hornblende-biotite granite (with negligible amount of hornblende) and biotite granite in the western part, and two-mica granite and biotite granodiorite in the eastern part. Field evidence for magma mingling is easily found in the biotite granodiorite, where dark enclaves with tonalitic composition occur. Enclaves range from a few centimeters to half a meter in size, and from ellipsoidal to rounded in shape. They occur individually and in homogeneous swarms. The mixing textures in the enclaves include fine-grained texture, acicular apatite, rounded plagioclase xenocrysts, ocellar quartz and blade-shaped biotite. The most interesting feature of the enclaves is the presence of numerous monazite-(Ce) crystals, including unusually large crystals (up to 500 μm) which have grown close to the boundaries between granodiorite and enclaves. The crystallization of numerous monazite grains may therefore be another, previously undescribed, form of textural evidence for interaction between two contrasting magmas. The textures and microtextures may indicate that the enclaves represent globules of hybrid magma formed by mingling with a more felsic host melt. Chemical dating of the monazite yielded an age of 297±11 Ma.
Charnockites – i.e., orthopyroxene-bearing felsic rocks – were formed in a deep-seated dry environment, either under plutonic or high-grade metamorphic conditions. Most charnockites known from the crystalline basement of Poland appear to be of Mesoproterozoic age (1.50–1.54 Ga), cogenetic with the Suwałki Anorthosite Massif, and associated with mangerite and granite members forming the AMCG suite of the Mazury Complex. Genetically distinct rocks, characterised by the presence of anhydrous minerals, e.g., orthopyroxene and garnet, were also recognised along 592 m of the Łanowicze PIG-1 borehole section, within the AMCG suite. U-Pb geochronology by sensitive high resolution ion microprobe (SHRIMP) was used to date the complexly zoned zircons. The ages of crystallisation of the charnockite protoliths from various depths at 1837±7, 1850±9, 1842±6, and 1881±16 Ma makes these rocks the oldest dated crust within this part of the Polish basement. The Łanowicze PIG-1 borehole section bears components from neighbouring tectonic domains known from Lithuania: the West and Middle Lithuanian (WL/MLD) domains considered as a continental margin at 1.84–1.86 Ga and the fragmented Latvia-East Lithuania (LEL) domain, where the oldest continental crust was generated at c. 1.89– 1.87 Ga. The metamorphic zircon overgrowths document a high-grade event at 1.79 Ga and then constrained at 1.5 Ga. Dating of pre-Mesoproterozoic crust cryptic within the AMCG Mazury Complex provides valuable information on the nature of the pre-existing blocks formed during the long lasting Svecofennian orogeny.
The chevkinite group of minerals are REE,Ti-silicates increasingly recognized as widespread accessory phases in a wide range of igneous and metamorphic parageneses. Members of the group are here recorded from five localities in Poland: a two-pyroxene andesite from the Kłodzko-Złoty Stok intrusion, a trachyandesite intrusion north of the Pieniny Mountains, a rapakivi-type granite from the Krasnopol intrusion, an anorthosite from the Suwałki Anorthosite Massif, and nepheline syenite from the Ełk syenite massif. Specific members found are chevkinite-(Ce), perrierite-(Ce) and, potentially, the Al-dominant analogue of perrierite-(Ce). The case is made that chevkinite-group minerals will, through systematic investigation, be found in a wide range of Polish igneous and metamorphic rocks.