Journal of Asian Earth Sciences 18 (2000) 761779

www.elsevier.nl/locate/jseaes

Stratigraphic constraints on suture models for eastern Indonesia

J. Milsom
Department of Geological Sciences, University College London, London WC1E 6BT, UK
Received 10 May 2000; accepted 29 June 2000

Abstract
Although collision in eastern Indonesia is now accreting the Australian continent to Southeast Asia, the small North and South Banda
oceanic basins within the suture zone are interpreted as Late Cenozoic extensional features. Stratigraphic columns from the surrounding
islands conform to one of three generalised patterns, two of which can be related to the margins of SE Asia (Sundaland) and the Australian
continent, respectively. The third system, which is dominant in the outer Banda Arc and eastern Sulawesi, is associated with a microcontinent
that was rifted from Australia in the Jurassic, drifted northwards ahead of Australia in the Cretaceous and collided with the Sundaland Margin
in the Paleogene. Subsequent collapse of the resulting collision orogen led to rapid extension and the formation of the Banda Sea behind the
Outer Banda Arc thrust belt. Eastern Indonesia thus duplicates a pattern familiar in the Mediterranean. The Tertiary compressional structures
of the region cannot be explained solely in terms of the most recent collision, which began only in the Pliocene. 2000 Elsevier Science Ltd.
All rights reserved.
Keywords: Eastern Indonesia; Banda Arc; Eurasian Plates

1. Introduction
Suturing of northern Australia to SE Asia takes place
within a diffuse and still poorly understood region (Fig. 1)
where relative motions between the Indo-Australian and
Eurasian Plates are absorbed by subduction beneath the
Sunda Arc and collision around the strongly curved Banda
Arc. The plate boundary, which south of the Sunda Arc is
marked by a deep trench, is replaced in the Banda Arc by a
series of relatively shallow troughs. There is no significant
offset in the line of active and recent volcanoes but the two
forearcs are very different. Except in the area to the west of
Sumatra, the Sunda forearc ridge is entirely submarine, but
the Banda forearc (Outer Banda Arc) is capped by large
islands such as Timor, Tanimbar, Seram and Buru (Fig.
1). The origin of the back-arc Banda Sea is still unclear,
with some authors (e.g. Silver et al., 1985) regarding the
oceanic parts as trapped slices of Indian Ocean or Molucca
Sea crust, while others (Hamilton, 1979; Rehault et al.,
1994) have argued in favour of Neogene extension. A
pattern of local extension in an overall collisional environment suggests analogies with the Mediterranean, where
continental collision has produced deep basins floored by
attenuated continental crust in the Alboran and Aegean seas
and by oceanic crust in parts of the Tyrrhenian Sea (Dewey,
E-mail address: [email protected] (J. Milsom).

1988). The Mediterranean basins resemble the Banda Sea,

not merely in size, but also in being partly enclosed by
orogens with total curvatures approaching 180 (Fig. 2).
Many of the allochthonous terranes which make up eastern Indonesia are of Australasian origin. This is true not
only of the large landmass of New Guinea, which is still
linked to Australia, but of many of the smaller islands on the
Asian side of the collision suture. Some of this material has
been transferred from Australasia to Eurasia during the
Pleistocene and continuing Banda Arc collision, but other
fragments must have been accreted earlier. Two important
Australian elements are Buton Island, southeast of Sulawesi, and the Banggai and Sula Islands, which form the
Sula Spur (Fig. 1). There is a wide measure of agreement (Hamilton, 1979; Milsom, 1985; Silver et al.,
1985) that the Sula Spur is a fragment of New Guinea
which was transported west along transcurrent faults
during the late Tertiary. Observations made in the
course of oil exploration programmes have dated its
collision with the East Arm of Sulawesi to between
5.2 and 3.8 Ma (Davies, 1990).
The history of Buton, which collided with the Sundaland
Margin much earlier, in the Early or Middle Miocene, is
more controversial (Davidson, 1991). One school of thought
considers it to have also come from the Birdshead (Smith
and Silver, 1991), but the correlations with New Guinea are
less convincing, whereas the Mesozoic sediments are

1367-9120/00/$ - see front matter 2000 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.
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762

J. Milsom / Journal of Asian Earth Sciences 18 (2000) 761779

126 o E

5a

Sula Is.

SULAWESI
8a

NORTH
BANDA
BASIN

o
Fa
ul

3a

U.P.

Bone
Bay

134 E
BIRDSHEAD
(Irian Jaya)
5b

1
La
wa
no
p

130 E
Misool

Obi

Seram

8b

6b

Buru

4b

TBJ-1X
Onin
Se
ram
Peninsula
Tr
ou
gh Komewa

Peninsula

Buton

Banda
Ridges

6a

Kai

WEBER

6 S

Flores Sea
Islands

SOUTH

BANDA

BASIN

BASIN

gh

2 oS

Banggai

Ar
uT
ro u

122 o E

Aru

Wetar
Alor

Flores
3b
o

10 S

Tanimbar

Timor
3

9b

ugh
r Tro

o
Tim

9a

ST
H WE

Sumba

T
NOR

4a

200

SHEL

400 km

Fig. 1. The East Indonesia suture zone. Numbers enclosed in triangles, inverted triangles and circles refer to figure numbers for stratigraphic columns for,
respectively, stratigraphies of the Australian Margin association, the Banda association and the Sundaland Margin association. The thick line with triangles (on
upper plate) indicates the approximate present-day location of collision suture. UP Ujung Pandang.

virtually identical to those on the northern Banda Arc

islands of Buru and Seram.
The Australian-derived fragments listed above all
contrast strongly with Sumba, the westernmost island in
the Outer Banda Arc (Fig. 1), which resembles SW Sulawesi. Thus, and in very simple terms, the geology of eastern
Indonesia can be summarised by three generalised associations of sedimentary, metamorphic and igneous rocks, of
which two are related to the continental margins of Southeast Asia (Sundaland) and Australasia, respectively. The
third, Banda, association is dominant in and around the
Banda Sea. The stratigraphic data, while not defining the
entire history of the suture zone, can be used to constrain the
range of acceptable hypotheses.

2. Sundaland Margin Association

Subduction at the Sundaland Margin can be traced back
into the Cretaceous, and the exposed metamorphic rocks are
thought to represent Cretaceous accretionary complexes.
Conditions changed in the Oligo-Miocene as a result of
collision with a microcontinent and many of the younger
rocks record extension rather than compression.

2.1. SW Sulawesi
SW Sulawesi is the end product of a series of volcanic
episodes that began in the late Mesozoic, when the block
was joined to eastern Borneo, but continued after the Eocene
opening of the Macassar Straits (Polve et al., 1997). Metamorphic basement complexes exposed in the Barru and
Bantimala areas of SW Sulawesi (Wakita et al., 1996) and
farther north in the Latimojong area (Bergman et al., 1996)
are in thrust or depositional contact with weakly metamorphosed deep marine clastics of the Upper Cretaceous
Balangbaru Formation. Carbonates were deposited in two
main periods, in the EoceneOligocene and Miocene
(Wilson and Bosence, 1996). Volcanogenic sediments are
widely distributed, especially in the fault-bounded Walanae
depression that developed following the Late Oligocene or
Early Miocene collision, which sutured western and eastern
Sulawesi. Volcanic rocks with ages ranging from 2 to
18 Ma, but concentrated around 8 Ma, were interpreted by
Bergman et al. (1996) as evidence for orogenic collapse and
extension, their chemistries being consistent with partial
melting at the base of an extending, collision-thickened
and possibly delaminating lithosphere. This conclusion
was endorsed by Polve et al. (1997), who noted the

J. Milsom / Journal of Asian Earth Sciences 18 (2000) 761779

763

Tethyan Oroclines

Tyrrhenian

Carpathian
Banda Sea

Alboran

500 km

Aegean

Fig. 2. The Banda, Tyrrhenian, Alboran, Aegean and Carpathian oroclines, at common scale.

comparative scarcity of conventional subduction-type calcalkaline rocks with Neogene ages. The geological evolution
of western Sulawesi is summarised by the stratigraphic
column of Fig. 3a, which does not, however, include the
important but controversial Lamasi Complex. The date of
emplacement of this deformed, metamorphosed and thrust
bounded ophiolite (Bergman et al., 1996) is not known but
the mid-Tertiary orogenic phase is an obvious possibility.
2.2. Flores Sea Islands
Bouguer gravity levels indicate that the northern part of
the Flores Sea, south of Sulawesi, is underlain by thinned
continental crust, but that there is oceanic crust further south
(Silver et al., 1986). The small and scattered islands within
the sea have been described by Guntoro (1995) as closely
related to the longitudinally corresponding areas of Sulawesi, with acid igneous rocks in the west and more basic
igneous rocks in the east. A volcanic sequence (Old Volcanic Breccia) in the western islands is equivalent to the Langi
Volcanics of SW Sulawesi, and the unconformably overlying bioclastic limestones, reliably dated as Oligocene,
are equivalent to the upper, bioclastic, units of the Tonasa
Limestone described by Wilson and Bosence (1996). Widespread calc-alkaline and alkaline, granitic to rhyolitic plutonic and volcanic rocks have not been dated, and their

contacts with other rocks have not been seen, but they
contain dioritic xenoliths interpreted as belonging to the
Old Volcanic Breccia. These suggest an age no greater
than Eocene and a probable correlation with the Early to
Middle Miocene granites of SW Sulawesi.
Volcanic activity recommencing in the Pleistocene,
produced the Young Volcanic Breccia, which consists of
conglomerate, volcanic tuff and volcanic breccia of andesitic and basaltic composition. Alkaline andesitic and basaltic
dykes and sills intrude all units except the Quaternary coral
limestones. As in western Sulawesi, the combination of
calc-alkaline and alkaline chemistries suggests both subduction and extension.
2.3. Sumba
The Flores Sea Islands form a partial link between SW
Sulawesi and the Outer Banda Arc island of Sumba (Fig. 1),
which lies to the west of the region of current arc-continent
collision. The position of Sumba, and the absence there of
any Australasian material, is evidence that the large islands
of the Outer Arc do not owe their existence solely to accretion in the course of the present-day collision.
The oldest rocks exposed on Sumba are Cretaceous open
marine sediments of the Lasipu Formation, described by
Wensink (1997) as identical to the Balangbaru of SW

764

SW SULAWESI

SUMBA

3a

3b

WALANAE
FORMATION

Shales
Coals
Tholeiitic and
calc-alkaline
volcanics

BALANGBARU FORMATION

Deep marine
clastic sediments

EARLY

Tectonic melange;
sandstones, shales,
cherts, basalt
ultramafics and
schists

PAUMBAP A
FORMATION

MASU
FORMATION
PALEOCENE

JAWILA
VOLCANICS

Volcaniclastics

Chalk and
reef limestones

Shallow marine sediments

including platform carbonates

EOCENE

Neritic
Sediments

Tholeiitic and
calc-alkaline
volcanics

Turbidites and
submarine fan
deposits

LASIPUFORMATION

100

BARRU, BANTIMALA AND

LATIMOJONG COMPLEXES

OLIGOCENE

50

CRETACEOUS

MESOZOIC

100

Carbonate platform with

redeposited marginal facies

LANGI
VOLCANICS

LATE

PALEOCENE

MIOCENE

KANANGGAR
WAIKABUBAK

LATE

50

MALA WA
FORMATION

Volcaniclastics

EARLY

EOCENE

TONASA
LIMESTONE

PLIOCENE

CENOZOIC

OLIGOCENE

CAMBA
FORMATION

Fig. 3. (a) Stratigraphic column for SW Sulawesi, after Bergman et al. (1996) and Wilson and Bosence (1996). (b) Stratigraphic column for Sumba, after Fortuin et al. (1997) and Wensink (1994). Numbers in
inverted triangles refer to locations shown in Fig. 1. Vertical scale in m.y.

J. Milsom / Journal of Asian Earth Sciences 18 (2000) 761779

CENOZOIC

MIOCENE

Carbonate
platform

TACIPI
MEMBER

CRETACEOUS

PLIOCENE

Reef limestones

QU ATERNARY REEF

MESOZOIC

Shallow marine
clastics

IRIAN JAYA

TIM O R G AP
4a

4b

MT. GOODWIN
FOR MATION

Non-marine siliciclastic
Marine siltstone
and shales

300

LATE

KEMBELANGAN GROUP

EARLY
LATE
MIDDLE

CENOZOIC

200

EKMAI
SANDSTONE
PINYA
MUDSTONE

WONWOGI
SANDSTONE

Dense, well bedded

calcilutite
Massive to thickly-bedded
quartz sandstone and siltstone
Micaceous glauconitic and
micaceous sands and silts
Thickly-bedded micaceous and
glauconitic orthoquartzite

?
Argillaceous, glauconitic and
calcarous quartz sandstone
and silty mudstone

KOPAI
FOR MATION

EARLY

Continental redbeds

IMSKIN

LATE

TROUGHTON GROUP

Paralic to shallow marine clastics

and carbonates

TIPUMA
FOR MATION

Continental redbeds

E
L

EARLY

MALITA
FOR MATION
CAPE LONDONDER RY
FOR MATION

PALEOCENE

PERMIAN

PLOVER FOR MATION

Marine shales
and sandstones

EARLY

TRIASSIC
PERMIAN

LATE

EARLY

MIDDLE

LATE

FLAMINGO GR OUP

100

Shallow water platform

carbonates with isolated reefs

EOCENE

CRETACEOUS

EARLY

Marine glauconitic shales

MESOZOIC

BATHUR ST ISLAND
GR OUP

Marine clastics deposited

at a wide variety of depths

NEW GUINEA
LIMESTONE

OLIGOCENE

TRIASSIC

LATE

Radiolarian chalk

PAL E O Z O I C

PALEOCENE

MIOCENE

JURASSIC

EOCENE

JURASSIC

MESOZOIC

PAL E O Z O I C

Semi-consolidated pelagic
and nanno chalks

OLIGOCENE

200

300

ASHMOR E
LIMESTONE

Sandstones
and clays

J. Milsom / Journal of Asian Earth Sciences 18 (2000) 761779

100

STEENKOOL FOR MATION

PLIOCENE

MIOCENE

CRETACEOUS

CENOZOIC

PLIOCENE

?
AIFAM
GR OUP

?
Nonmarine, lacustrine and
paralic sediments, some coals

Fig. 4. (a) Stratigraphic column for the Timor Gap region of the Northwest Shelf, after Brown (1992). (b) Stratigraphic column for Irian Jaya, after Pieters et al. (1983). Numbers in triangles refer to locations
shown in Fig. 1. Vertical scale in m.y.
765

766

SULA SPUR

BANGGAI
GRANITE

Slates,
schists and
gneisses

300

LATE

EARLY

LATE

PALEOCENE

EARLY

TRIASSIC

Acid to
intermediate
intrusives

PAL E O Z O I C

Subaerial acid
volcanics

CRYSTALLINE
BASEMENT

Calcarenite with minor oolite

200

Z AAG LIMESTONE

EOCENE

MIDDLE

MESOZOIC

Intrusives

Paralic to shallow marine clastics

and carbonates
Continental redbeds

MANGOLE
VOLCANICS

Calcilutite/calcarenite

DARAM SANDSTONE
FAFANLAP FOR MATION

Sandstone, calcareous
siltstone
Siltstone
Clays (limestones
on Misool)

JASS
POLYSEQUENCE
FACET
LIMESTONE
SEBYAR
POLYSEQUENCE

Deepwater clays

R OABIBA
POLYSEQUENCE

Sandy paralic to
nearshore clastics

INANWATAN
POLYSEQUENCE

YEFBI
SHALE
BOGAL
LIMESTONE

LATE

LATE
EARLY
LATE
MIDDLE

KABAU W
FOR MATION

EARLY

PERMIAN

Restricted shallow marine

anoxic and highly
fossiliferous shales

LATE

EARLY

JURASSIC

MESOZOIC

300

PAL E O Z O I C

TRIASSIC

200

KASIM MAR LSTONE

OLIGOCENE

Highly fosilliferous pelagic

limestones

100

BOBONG FOR MATION

MIOCENE

Tuffaceous
calcilutite
and
clayey
limestone

Paralic to shallow marine

and fluvial clastics
Calcarenite
and coralgal
limestone

TIPUMA
FOR MATION

Continental redbeds

EARLY

PALEOCENE

BUYA
FOR MATION

Fine-grained calcarenite

?
?

?
?
AIFAM
GR OUP

?
?
LIGU
METAMOR PHICS

Nonmarine, lacustrine and

paralic sediments, some coals

Fig. 5. (a) Stratigraphic column for the Sula Spur, after Garrard et al. (1988). (b) Misool. In the Mesozoic and Paleozoic, the formations and polysequences identified on the left are after Fraser et al. (1993). All
other data from Rusmana et al. (1989). Numbers in triangles refer to locations shown in Fig. 1. Vertical scale in m.y.

J. Milsom / Journal of Asian Earth Sciences 18 (2000) 761779

100

Shallow water platform

carbonates with isolated reefs

EOCENE

TANAMU
FOR MATION

ATKAR I LIMESTONE

PERMIAN

CENE

5b
PLIOCENE

CENOZOIC

PANCORAN FOR MATION

OLIGOSALODIC FOR MATION

CRETACEOUS

CENOZOIC

MIOCENE

Shallow marine carbonates

with localised reefs

CRETACEOUS

PELENG FOR MATION

PLIOCENE

JURASSIC

5a

MISOOL

J. Milsom / Journal of Asian Earth Sciences 18 (2000) 761779

Sulawesi. Mid-Cretaceous dinoflagellates suggest a North

Tethys affinity (Fortuin et al., 1997). The upper age limit of
the Lasipu is uncertain, but there was widespread igneous
activity in the Late Cretaceous and Paleogene. The Jawila
Volcanics, originally thought to be Early Miocene, have
now been dated as Late Eocene (Fortuin et al., 1997) and
can be regarded as part of a belt that includes the Langi
Volcanics of Sulawesi and the Old Volcanic Breccia of
Tanahjumpea. Also in the Eocene, a platform developed
and, as with the Tonasa of SW Sulawesi, remained a site
of carbonate sedimentation (Paumbapa Formation) into the
Early Miocene (Fortuin et al., 1997). The Paleogene sediments are truncated by a Middle Miocene angular unconformity above which reef carbonates, chalks and
volcanoclastic turbididites were deposited. The stratigraphy
of Sumba is summarised in Fig. 3b; the similarities to SW
Sulawesi are clear and are enhanced in both areas by the
presence of Eocene granodioritic intrusions.
Extensive paleomagnetic work (Wensink, 1997) has
provided additional support for a Late Mesozoic position
of Sumba close to western Sulawesi, followed by detachment and a complicated series of rotations, the net effect of
which has been some 90 of clockwise rotation. This
contrasts with the mounting evidence for counter-clockwise
rotation of Kalimantan and western Sulawesi (Fuller et al.,
1999).
2.4. Sundaland Margin summary
The diagnostic features of the Sundaland Margin stratigraphy include Upper CretaceousPaleogene deep-water
clastic sediments, volcanics which are of island arc type
in the Paleogene but extensional in the Neogene, and the
development of large carbonate platforms in the Eocene
Early Miocene. The type area is the South Arm of Sulawesi
and, in particular, the region northeast of Ujung Pandang
(Fig. 1). Similar, although not always complete, Mesozoic
and Paleogene sections can be recognised in the Flores Sea
Islands and Sumba. Sediments above the mid-Miocene
angular unconformity, which is a feature of the association,
show fewer common characteristics, which is unsurprising
if dispersion began during the unrecorded interval. Dispersion, and the generation of oceanic crust in the Flores Sea,
must predate the Late Neogene development of the eastern
Sunda/Banda volcanic arc, because this lies to the north of
Sumba. Since the volcanic islands from Flores to Wetar
separate two Sunda-related blocks, it is possible, and
perhaps even probable, that they are themselves built on
Sundaland basement, although this is nowhere exposed.
3. Australasian Margin Association
Sediments were deposited along the Australian Margin
under terrestrial or marginal marine conditions in the Triassic and Jurassic and in deeper water during and after the
Cretaceous. Basement rocks in the east belong to a Late

767

Paleozoic orogenic belt and in the west to a craton covered

by Paleozoic platform sediments. Anomalously, eastern
granitic basement crops out in the Banggai Islands (Fig.
1), the most northwesterly Australasian fragment. Neogene
sediments vary widely due to differences in setting in relation to the collision orogenies.
3.1. The Northwest Shelf
During the Paleozoic, north-western Australia formed
part of the interior of the Gondwana super-continent, but
rifting in the Triassic and Jurassic detached India and
other blocks and created new passive margins along the
Northwest Shelf. Sediments deposited at these margins are
almost nowhere seen in outcrop but are known from numerous wells. The stratigraphy of the shelf to the south of Timor
has been described and compared with stratigraphies in
adjacent areas by Brown (1992). Three major sedimentary
groups were recognised, these being the TriassicJurassic
Troughton Group, the JurassicCretaceous Flamingo Group
and the Middle and Upper Cretaceous Bathurst Island
Group (Fig. 4a). Troughton group sediments are predominantly siliciclastic and include red beds in the Malita Formation, which is of latest Triassic and earliest Jurassic age.
Marine transgression followed, with deposition of the
fluvio-deltaic sediments of the Jurassic Plover Formation.
There are no sediments which can be unequivocally
assigned to a rift/break-up setting before the Late Jurassic
when, as a result of rifting, an unconformity developed on
which the sandstones and shales of the Flamingo Group
were deposited under deeper marine conditions. Generally
similar sediments characterise the Bathurst Group, deposited following an Early Cretaceous hiatus, but the sea had
evidently deepened still further. Radiolarian shales were
deposited in the Aptian to Early Albian and a black claystone with high gamma-ray signature represents a condensed
sequence in the Turonian to Coniacian. Chalks were then
deposited, which were dominantly radiolarian in the Late
Cretaceous and foraminiferal in the Paleocene through to
the Pliocene (von Rad and Exon, 1983). Harris (1991) noted
strong similarities between these sediments and the Lower
Cretaceous Kolbano Series of Timor.
3.2. New Guinea
Island arcs, which accreted to the northern margin of
Australia during the Tertiary, now form mountain ranges
along the north coast of New Guinea (Dow, 1977). These
terranes can be tentatively correlated with Halmahera,
where Indonesia borders on the Pacific, but are remote
from the Banda Arc and are therefore not further considered
here. Southern and central New Guinea have also been interpreted in terms of large numbers of allochthonous or
suspect terranes (Struckmeyer et al., 1993), but most of
the geological features of northern Australia can be traced at
least as far north as the watershed in the central ranges. The
western peninsula (Birdshead), which forms the link

768

J. Milsom / Journal of Asian Earth Sciences 18 (2000) 761779

between the main body of New Guinea and the smaller

islands of eastern Indonesia, presents particular problems.
It is widely thought to have moved independently for much
of its history (cf. Hamilton, 1979) and some movement
relative to New Guinea continues to the present day (Puntodewo et al., 1994). The core of the peninsula is formed by
the Birdshead/Kemum Terrane of Struckmeyer et al. (1993),
in which metamorphosed Siluro-Devonian turbidites have
been intruded by Carboniferous and Permo-Triassic granitoids and are overlain by Late Paleozoic shallow marine
clastics and Triassic to Lower Jurassic continental redbeds.
Marginal marine conditions were re-established in the early
Middle Jurassic and continued throughout the Mesozoic and
into the early Tertiary, interspersed with periods of erosion
and non-deposition (Dolan and Hermany, 1988). Sediments
deposited during this long interval have traditionally been
assigned to the Kembelangan Formation (Visser and
Hermes, 1962) but the term has been used in such a variety
of contexts that it has become virtually meaningless (Fraser
et al., 1993). The stratigraphic column of Fig. 4b is based on
the more westerly of the New Guinea stratigraphies
presented by Pieters et al. (1983).
Shelf carbonates (New Guinea Limestone, Visser and
Hermes, 1962) dominate the Tertiary throughout New
Guinea but deposition on the Birdshead was interrupted
by a period of folding and erosion in the Late Oligocene.
3.3. The Sula Spur
The Banggai and Sula Islands, which lie immediately to
the north of the North Banda Basin and the northern limb of
the Banda Arc, were transported from the New Guinea
region to their present position by transcurrent movements
along strands of the Sorong Fault System (Hamilton, 1979;
Pigram et al., 1985). Basement consists of poorly known
metamorphics but there are also granitic rocks of assumed
Paleozoic age. The Triassic is dominated by the acid
Mangole Volcanics and by probably co-magmatic PermoTriassic granites. Sedimentation, generally in marine basins
with restricted circulation and water depths of less than
200 m, was almost continuous throughout the Jurassic but
a break-up unconformity (Garrard et al., 1988) occupies
much of the Cretaceous. Following this break, bathyal sediments were deposited during the Late Cretaceous and Paleocene (Garrard et al., 1988). A second hiatus occupied much
of the Eocene but thereafter carbonate platform sedimentation continued almost uninterrupted until the onset of collision with East Sulawesi in the latest Miocene (Davies,
1990). Davidson (1991), amongst others, has suggested
correlations between the Sula Spur and Buton and the
Outer Banda Arc but the statigraphic sequence described
above and summarised in Fig. 5a has virtually nothing in
common with either of these areas.
3.4. Kai Besar
Seismic reflection surveys near the Kai islands (Fig. 1)

have shown that the plate suture runs between Kai Besar and
Kai Kecil, rather than through the Aru Trough (Milsom et
al., 1996). The oldest rocks exposed on Kai Besar, on the
Australian side of the suture, are Eocene flat-bedded
calcilutites and marls. Shallow-water carbonates were
deposited from the Oligocene almost to the present day.
This stratigraphy is not significantly different from the
end-Cretaceous to Late Miocene succession on the Sula
Spur.
3.5. MisoolOninKomewa
The Late Oligocene compression widely observed in the
Birdshead was interpreted by Struckmeyer et al. (1993) as
due to a collision with a MisoolOninKomewa Terrane.
On Misool island a Paleozoic basement of folded and metamorphosed turbidites is overlain by an almost complete
Mesozoic passive margin sequence of Triassic turbidites,
Upper Triassic shallow-water limestones and Lower Jurassic to Upper Cretaceous bathyal clastics and carbonates
(Rusmana et al., 1989). Outcrop information on the geology
of Misool and the related Onin and Komewa peninsulas of
the New Guinea mainland (Fig. 1) has been supplemented
by drilling, and Fraser et al. (1993) used subsurface data
from both the MisoolOninKomewa province and adjacent parts of the Birdshead to develop a new scheme to
replace the Kembelangan nomenclature. In this scheme
the Mesozoic sediments were divided into a Lower to
Middle Jurassic shallow marine to fluvial Inanwatan Polysequence, a Middle to Upper Jurassic paralic to nearshore
Roabiba Polysequence, an Upper JurassicLower Cretaceous deepwater open marine Sebyar Polysequenceand an
Upper Cretaceous to Paleocene, Jass Polysequence, separated by major unconformities (Fig. 5b). In the crucial TBJ1X well (Fig. 1) off the Onin Peninsula (and therefore within
the MisoolOninKomewa Province), section is missing
from the Middle Triassic to the base of the Toarcian, from
the top of the Bajocian to the base of the Oxfordian, from the
Lower Kimmeridgian to the mid Tithonian and from the
Lower Valangian to the Cenomanian. Jass sediments have
also largely been removed from the well section by erosion.
Elsewhere, the Cenomanian base of the Jass is marked by a
volcanic event and the overlying sediments are mainly
deepwater clays, although shallow water rudists outcrop in
the Misool archipelago.
Fig. 5b shows that there are considerable differences
between the rocks outcropping on Misool and those intersected in TBJ-1X. Whereas the well section fits into the
pattern of the Australian Margin Association, Misool has
much in common with the Banda Association described
below, although it reportedly lacks the characteristic Jurassic unconformity. Moreover, palaeomagnetic data indicates
that the island was more than 1000 km north of Australia in
the Cretaceous (Wensink et al., 1989). There is thus a clear
possibility that Misool was detached from the Australian
Margin as an independent fragment in the Mesozoic and

SERAM

BUTON

Fossiliferous red calcareous

mudstone

WINTO
FOR MATION

Dark shales, limestones,

occasional massive sandstone

200
TRIASSIC

Bathyal fine-grained limestones

and argillaceous limestone

LAKANSAI
FOR MATION

Pelitic phyllite and slate

with subordinate quartzose
and micaceous sandstone

300

PAL E O Z O I C

E
L

NIEF BEDS

LATE
EARLY

LATE

OGENA
FOR MATION

Neritic sediments
Bathyal sediments

Tectonite

Grey argillaceous calcilututes

Cream and white calcilutites

red and green marls
Dense, brittle calcilututes,
some cherts

hiatus?
EAR LY NIEF BEDS

Argillaceous
calcilutites

hiatus?
LATE

PALEOCENE

KOLA SHALE

MIDDLE

Argillaceous limestone

PALAEOGENE
NIEF BEDS
hiatus?
LATE CR ETACEOUS
NIEF BEDS

LATE

R U MU
FOR MATION

EARLY NEOGENE NIEF BEDS

EOCENE

JURASSIC

Possible hiatus

erosional hiatus
hiatus?

EARLY

MESOZOIC

TOBELO FOR MATION

MIDDLE

LATE

EARLY

100

EARLY

JURASSIC

White to pink nannofossilmicrofossil pelagic

limestones, some cherts

LATE

TRIASSIC
PERMIAN

TOBELO FOR MATION

SALAS
BLOCK
CLAY

OLIGOCENE

M
E

MANUSELA

SAMAN
SAMAN
LST

FOR MATION
KANIKEH
FOR MATION
SAKU FOR MATION

EARLY

Well laminated calcilutite

with local clastic detritus

PALEOCENE

EARLY

MESOZOIC

PAL E O Z O I C

TOBELO FOR MATION

MIOCENE

PERMIAN

EOCENE

CRETACEOUS

CENOZOIC

OLIGOCENE

200

300

TONDO FORMATION

MIOCENE

FUFA FORMATION
WAHAI BEDS

PLIOCENE

TEHOR U FOR MATION

Neritic shales
Chert-rich
limestones,
Coralli- locally
genous bioclastic
limestones
Clays, shales,
graywackes,
some
limestones

J. Milsom / Journal of Asian Earth Sciences 18 (2000) 761779

100

SAMPOLAKOSA FORMATION

CENOZOIC

WAPULAKA FORMATION

PLIOCENE

6b

Reef Limestone
Pelagic foraminiferal marly chalk
Coarse to fine grained
terrigenous clastics

CRETACEOUS

6a

Weakly metamorphosed shales,

graywackes, some limestones
Phyllites with graywackes,
some limestones
POSSIBLE GRADATIONAL CONTACT

TAU NUSA COMPLEX

KOBIPOTO COMPLEX

Medium - high grade

schists and gneisses.
High - very high grade
schists and gneisses

Fig. 6. (a) Stratigraphic column for Buton, after Davidson (1991). (b) Stratigraphic column for Seram, after Kemp and Mogg (1992). Numbers in circles refer to locations shown in Fig. 1. Vertical scale in m.y.

769

770

J. Milsom / Journal of Asian Earth Sciences 18 (2000) 761779

Undifferentiated Mesozoic
Cretaceous limestone
Jurassic limestone
Jurassic/Triassic clastics

La
wa
n

op

oF
au

lt

Fig. 7. Distribution of Mesozoic sedimentary rocks in eastern Sulawesi, after Sukamto (1975).

collided with the Birdshead in the Mid-Tertiary, when the

older sediments were folded. More detailed work is needed
on the Mesozoic rocks, which are well exposed on the south
coast of Misool and the islands immediately to the south, to
clarify their role in the regional evolution.

The later Mesozoic in all areas records a steady increase in

water depth, from marginal marine in the Jurassic to open
water bathyal in the later Cretaceous. During the Tertiary,
parts of the margin were fragmented and/or involved in
collisions, and Tertiary stratigraphies therefore differ
considerably.

3.6. Australian Margin summary

The wide variations in Australian Margin stratigraphies
are not surprising in view of the vast area covered. The type
area for the association is taken to be the shelf south of
Timor (the Timor Gap). Western Irian Jaya, including
the Birdshead, and the Sula Spur, are included in this association but their basements of Late Paleozoic granites and
associated extrusive rocks have more in common with
central Papua New Guinea than the Northwest Shelf. Misool
island is different again and lacks the terrestrial Triassic red
beds deposited elsewhere in the region prior to, and at the
beginning, of the break-up of this part of Gondwanaland.

4. Banda Association
The Banda Association, which is found on the islands
surrounding the Banda Sea, progresses from Upper Triassic
to Lower Jurassic shallow water clastics and carbonates
which are richly fossiliferous and sometimes bituminous,
via unconformity to an Upper Jurassic to Paleogene
condensed sequence of deep water carbonates and cherts
from which clastic components are almost completely
absent. The Middle to Late Jurassic hiatus is an important
diagnostic feature. It is widely recognised on the Australian

EAST SULAWESI
REEF LIMESTONE

BURU
Reef Limestone

LATE
EARLY
EARLY

PERMIAN

PAL E O Z O I C

300

Basaltic
lavas
and tuffs

MEFA
FM.

GHEGAN
FOR MATION

DALAN
FOR MATION

Dolomites,
shales, some
bituminous,
limestones

Interbedded
sandstones, shales,
siltstones, some
conglomerates

Low to high
grade metamorphics

Marls, calcilutites, conglomerates

Cherty calcilutites
interbedded with
conglomerates in the
lower part and
marl and shale in the
upper parts

KUMA
FOR MATION

LATE
LATE

200

Bituminous limestones,
and shales

Sandstones

PALEOCENE

POMPANGEO
SCHIST

WAEKEN FOR MATION

Coral and
foram. lst

EOCENE

TRIASSIC

MELU HU
FOR MATION

Bathyal fine-grained limestones

and argillaceous limestone

HOTONG
FTAU

EARLY

MESOZOIC

LATE
MIDDLE
LATE

TOKALA
FOR MATION

OLIGOCENE

WAKATIN

MIDDLE

CENOZOIC

100

EARLY

PERMIAN

TRIASSIC

PAL E O Z O I C

White to pink
porcellaneous pelagic
limestones

EARLY

MATANO FOR MATION

EARLY

JURASSIC

MESOZOIC

LATE

PALEOCENE

200

300

CELEBES LIMESTONE

Reefal and nummulitic

limestone

MIOCENE

CRETACEOUS

EOCENE

Coarse to fine grained

terrigenous clastics

LEKO FOR MATION

RANA COMPLEX

WAHLUA COMPLEX

J. Milsom / Journal of Asian Earth Sciences 18 (2000) 761779

100

CELEBES MOLASSE

OLIGOCENE

CRETACEOUS

CENOZOIC

MIOCENE

Coral reef
Conglomerate, sst, lst

8b
PLIOCENE

PLIOCENE

JURASSIC

8a

Low grade (greenschist

facies) metamorphosed
clastics

Medium-grade (greenschist
to amphibolite)
metamorphosed clastics

Fig. 8. (a) Stratigraphic column for East Sulawesi, after Rusmana et al. (1993). (b) Stratigraphic column for Buru, after Tjokrosapoetro et al. (1993). Numbers in circles refer to locations shown in Fig. 1. Vertical
scale in m.y.
771

772

J. Milsom / Journal of Asian Earth Sciences 18 (2000) 761779

Northwest Shelf, where it was termed Wombat-type by

Gradstein (1992) following ODP drilling on the Wombat
Plateau. There are many similarities between the Mesozoic
sediments of the Wombat Plateau and the Banda Association. However, whereas the Mesozoic of the plateau rests on
a thick unmetamorphosed Paleozoic section, metamorphic
rocks, upon which the Triassic sediments are said to rest
unconformably, are common in the Banda Association, as
are CretaceousPaleocene ophiolites. Stratigraphies in the
various Banda fragments diverge significantly only after the
Oligocene, when many of the blocks were deformed by
thrusting.
4.1. Buton
Buton is one of the most important islands of the Banda
Association because of its present close proximity to Sulawesi (Fig. 1). Drawing in part on work by Fortuin et al.
(1990) and De Smet and Hermanto (1991), Davidson
(1991) deduced separation from Australia in the Late Triassic or Early Jurassic and a transition from pre-rift to syn-rift
sedimentation in the Middle to Late Triassic. The Triassic
rocks (Winto Formation) rest on pelitic phyllites and slates
(Lakansai Formation) which are exposed over an area of
only about 40 km 2 in the northeast of the island (Smith
and Silver, 1991). Both the Winto and the overlying
Lower Jurassic Ogena Formation consist dominantly of
limestone, but the Ogena appears to have been deposited in deeper water. Clastic sediments, principally
shales, are common in the Winto of southern Buton.
Both formations contain abundant organic material that
is generally considered to be the source of the islands
asphalt deposits.
The poorly exposed later Mesozoic on Buton begins with
deep marine siliceous and calcareous mudstones of the
Upper Jurassic Rumu Formation and continues with the
pelagic limestones with nodules and stringers of red chert
of the Tobelo Formation. The Tobelo was originally classified as entirely Upper Cretaceous but has now been
shown to extend from the end of Rumu deposition up
into the late Eocene or early Oligocene (Smith and
Silver, 1991). Both the Rumu and the Tobelo were
evidently laid down very slowly and their lithologies
are consistent with deposition during the drift of an
isolated continental fragment.
According to Davidson (1991), a hiatus at the top of the
Tobelo Formation can be attributed to collision with SE
Sulawesi in the Early and Middle Miocene (N11). Ophiolites in southern Buton were probably emplaced at about this
time, and compression led to uplift and the establishment of
an unconformity representing a hiatus of approximately
3 m.y. The basal sediments of the coarse clastic Tondo
Formation, immediately above the unconformity, are
mainly carbonate detritus but ultramafic and mafic fragments become dominant later, indicating uplift of the ophiolites above sea level.

Tondo Formation deposition was ended by subsidence of

Buton to bathyal depths at approximately 5 Ma and the
deposition of chalks and marls. Subsequent uplift was
accompanied by the development of reefal carbonates.
Minor compressional effects can be observed in Upper
Pliocene strata, and oblique compression and associated
strike-slip faulting may continue to the present day.
Quaternary uplift in southern Buton, where spectacular
flights of coral terraces rise to almost 500 m above sea
level, has been estimated at 2.5 km, but the northern
part of the island is now subsiding (Davidson, 1991).
The history of post-Middle Miocene molasse deposition
and ophiolite emplacement on Buton is virtually identical with that of eastern Sulawesi, and the 5 Ma subsidence seems much more likely to have been caused by
extensional collapse of the entire Sulawesi orogen, of
which Buton formed a part (Milsom et al., 1999), than
by the choking of a subduction zone, as suggested by
Davidson (1991).
4.2. Buru
The Mesozoic succession on Buru (Fig. 8b) is virtually
identical to that on Buton, even though the two islands are
separated by the oceanic North Banda Basin (Fig. 1). Bituminous Triassic source rocks which are abundantly present
in float in rivers in the northwest are directly comparable
with the Triassic of Buton, as is most of the Cretaceous
section. One distinctive feature of Buru, however, is the
presence of some Jurassic igneous material, which may be
compared with the rift phase volcanics of the Wallaby
Plateau (Gradstein, 1992). Buru also differs from Buton in
the abundance of metamorphic rocks, which cover almost
the whole of the western two-thirds of the island. These
metamorphics were divided by Tjokrosapoetro et al.
(1993) into the low grade Rana and higher grade Wahlua
Complexes. A recent reconnaissance along new roads into
the centre of the island confirmed this distinction (D.
Roques, personal communication, 2000).
As on Buton, the depositional environment on Buru
became shallower in the Tertiary, but there is no direct
evidence for Middle Miocene orogeny. Tjokrosapoetro et
al. (1993) described the island as characterised by the
absence of thrust faults, imbricated structures, melange or
ophiolites. The latest phase of the islands history has been
dominated by very rapid uplift and deposition of thick,
coarse alluvial fans (Fortuin et al., 1988). However, steep
gravity gradients recently mapped in the southeast of the
island are difficult to explain except by the presence of
concealed, thrust emplaced, ophiolites.
4.3. Seram
Buru and western Seram were described by Hamilton
(1979) as forming a single microcontinent, and certainly
the two islands are stratigraphically very similar. For
example, parallels have been drawn between the Rana

J. Milsom / Journal of Asian Earth Sciences 18 (2000) 761779

Metamorphics of Buru and the Tehoru Metamorphics of

Seram (Linthout et al., 1989). The sediments of Seram
were divided into allochthonous and para-autochthonous
units by Audley-Charles et al. (1979) but this was rendered
unconvincing by disagreement amongst the co-authors as to
whether the key Nief Beds, which span the time interval
from the Jurassic to the Oligocene, were to be assigned to
the allochthon or the para-autochthon. A different view
based in part on recent exploration drilling has been offered
by Kemp and Mogg (1992). In this scheme, the oldest unmetamorphosed sediments of Seram belong to the Middle to
Upper Triassic, clastic-dominated, near-shore Kanikeh
Formation, which grades into Lower and Middle Jurassic
deep and shallow water limestones (Manusela and Saman
Saman Formations, respectively) both upwards and laterally. If these relationships have been correctly interpreted,
then all the sediments of Seram can be fitted into a single
stratigraphic sequence (Fig. 6b).
The Kanikeh and SamanSaman are contemporaneous
with, and also strikingly similar to, respectively, the
Winto and Ogena Formations of Buton. Only the Manusela
Formation appears to lack a direct Buton equivalent. In view
of the small area of Mesozoic outcrop on Buton, there may
be little significance in this absence, or in the apparently
different durations of the Jurassic hiatus. The similarities
between Buton and Seram continue above the mid-Jurassic
unconformity, since the Late Jurassic Kola Shale of Seram
resembles the Rumu Formation of Buton and both are overlain by deep water condensed sequences dominated by foraminiferal limestones and marls which extend from the Early
Cretaceous into the Paleogene (Nief Beds on Seram and
Tobelo Formation on Buton). In both the Nief and Tobelo
there is evidence for shallower water conditions in the
Paleogene and eventual termination of carbonate sedimentation in the Miocene.
4.4. Western Kai and the Banda Ridges
Silicic schists, gneisses and migmatites on the westernmost islands of the Kai group have been correlated by Charlton et al. (1991b) with the Kobipoto Complex of Seram and
were considered by Honthaas et al. (1997) as uplifted parts
of a former Banda forearc.
Dredging on the high standing ridges (Banda Ridges) in
the central Banda Sea has recovered igneous and metamorphic rocks (Silver et al., 1985), Triassic sediments
(Villeneuve et al., 1994) and Miocene reefs (Cornee et al.,
1998). The metamorphics were originally correlated with
those of the Birdshead (Silver et al., 1985) but the descriptions of the Triassic rocks are much more reminiscent of
Buton, Buru and Seram.
4.5. Eastern Sulawesi
The geology of eastern Sulawesi is often described in
terms of a simple division into belts of schist and ophiolite
separated by the Lawanopo Fault (Fig. 1), but there are

773

schists to the north of this fault and ophiolites to the

south. Patterns of metamorphism are complex. Parkinson
(1998) considered that some of the metamorphic rocks
formed a high temperature metamorphic sole to the ophiolitic thrusts but it is not clear how widely this interpretation
can be applied. Both blueschists and greenschists are
present. Metamorphic facies vary and have been used to
define a number of distinct formations, but it is possible
that these grade into each other. The prevalence of thrusting,
and the reconnaissance nature of the mapping in many areas,
leave this question open.
Gravity data indicate that the ophiolites overlie the schists
on a thrust surface with variable but very shallow dip (Silver
et al., 1978). Relatively small south-block up movement
along the Lawanopo Fault could have created the present
outcrop pattern by exposing the southern parts of the ophiolite belt to more intensive erosion. Ultramafics south of the
Lawanopo Fault, which might represent deep keels to a
previously extensive thrust sheet, are associated with occasionally strong but very local positive gravity anomalies. If
schists, rather than ophiolites, predominate at depth, then
their age and origin are important in any regional synthesis. The most widely held view is that they represent
the basement of a microcontinent which collided with
western Sulawesi in the mid-Tertiary (Hamilton, 1979).
If this is the case, then Australasia seems the most
likely ultimate source, although Parkinson (1998) interpreted the main metamorphic formation, the Pompangeo
Schist Complex, as the easternmost extension of the
Mesozoic Sundaland Margin, metamorphosed in the
Early Cretaceous under intermediate high-pressure
conditions.
Mesozoic sediments, metamorphosed slightly or not at
all, are often ignored in regional descriptions but are very
widely distributed in eastern Sulawesi (Fig. 7). The main
periods represented are the TriassicLower Jurassic (terrestrial to marginal marine Meluhu Formation and deep water
Tokala Formation) and Cretaceous (deep water carbonatechert Matano Formation). Kundig (1956) estimated the total
Mesozoic section as little more than one kilometre thick on
the East Arm, but it may be thicker in the Southeast Arm,
where the outcrops are more extensive. He also
commented on similarities between the Triassic sediments along the southeastern margin of the East Arm,
where they form isolated klippen and comprise bituminous limestones and shales, and those of Buru. Surono
(1998), in describing the Meluhu Formation, noted that
palaeomagnetic determinations placed the site of deposition close to the then latitude of the North Australian
Margin.
The Cretaceous deep water sediments are generally
spatially associated with the ophiolite and might be
supposed to constitute its uppermost part. However,
Parkinson (1998) cited age relationships and the
reported existence of depositional contacts between the
Matano Formation and the schists as arguments against

774

TIMOR (PARA)- AUTOCHTHON

Interbedded calcilutites and

thin shales with radiolaria,
foraminifera and chert nodules

NAKFUNU
FOR MATION

Interbedded calcilutites and

thin shales with radiolaria,
foraminifera and chert nodules

OE BAAT FOR MATION

Massive glauconitic sandstone

100

WAI LULI
FOR MATION

EOCENE
PALEOCENE

Basalts and tuffs

CABLAC LIMESTONE

Shallow marine
bioclastic limestone

METAN FOR MATION

Agglomerate and tuff

HAU LASI
FOR MATION

Volcanics and
tuffaceous clastics

LATE

MENU FOR MATION

OLIGOCENE

OCUSSI VOLCANICS

NONI FOR MATION

EARLY

hiatus?

MIOCENE

LATE

CENOZOIC

Massive to thickly bedded

calcarenites, calcirudites
and recrystallised limestones

hiatus?

KEKNENO SEQUENCE

PLIOCENE

CRETACEOUS

EARLY
LATE
MIDDLE
EARLY
LATE
M

EARLY

TRIASSIC
PERMIAN

PAL E O Z O I C

LATE

PALEOCENE

OFU FOR MATION

KOLBANO SEQUENCE

EOCENE

JURASSIC

MESOZOIC

OLIGOCENE

200

300

erosional hiatus

MUTIS/LOLOTOI
COMPLEX

Limestone and
radiolarian chert
with
volcanics and
tuffaceous clastics
Medium-grade metamorphics
and ophiolite

Claystone and shale with

interbedded limestones,
calcilutites and siltstones

BABULU
Silts, shales and
FOR MATION Radiolaria-rich
sandstones
AITUTU
limestones and
LIMESTONE
shales
Shales with thin fine
NIOF
grained
sandstones (turbidites)
FOR MATION
Red crinoidal limestones
MAU BISSE
and basaltic pillow
FOR MATION
lavas
Shales with minor
ATAHOC
sandstones and tuffs. Weakly
FOR MATION
metamorphosed at base.
Slates,
phyllites, metaAILEU FOR MATION
quartzites, schists, rare marble.

Fig. 9. (a) Stratigraphic column for the Timor parautochthon and autochthon, after Sawyer et al. (1993) and Reed et al. (1996). (b) Stratigraphic column for the Timor allochthon, after Sawyer et al. (1993) and
Earle (1983). Numbers in triangles refer to locations shown in Fig. 1. Vertical scale in m.y.

J. Milsom / Journal of Asian Earth Sciences 18 (2000) 761779

100

MIOCENE

CRETACEOUS

CENOZOIC

PLIOCENE

9b

Varied deep and shallow

Scaly
BOBO- water deposits
clay
NAR O

MESOZOIC

VIQUEQUE
GR OUP

9a

TIMOR ALLOCHTHON

J. Milsom / Journal of Asian Earth Sciences 18 (2000) 761779

this assumption. The stratigraphic column for East Sulawesi shown in Fig. 8a is compared with the column for
Buru, where the proportions of outcrop of metamorphic
rocks and sediments are similar, although ophiolites are
absent.
4.6. Banda Association summary
The Banda Association is characterised by a variety of
metamorphic rocks, some of which may represent continental basement and others which may be the metamorphic
soles to ophiolite sheets, and ophiolitic rocks which are
only occasionally strongly metamorphosed. The sedimentary record begins in the Triassic with deposition under
fluvial or marginal marine conditions. Water depths
increased, and carbonate deposition became more widespread, in the Early Jurassic. Sediments of this generally
conformable sequence are frequently bituminous. They are
found in outcrop on Buton (where they source asphalt
deposits; Davidson, 1991) and Buru, and source oil on
Seram (Peters et al., 1999).
A characteristic feature of the Banda Association is the
presence of a major unconformity encompassing at least a
major part of the Late Jurassic and sometimes much of the
Middle Jurassic and Early Cretaceous. The sediments
immediately above this unconformity are generally shales
but quickly give way to condensed sequences of carbonates
with cherts, deposited in environments remote from sources
of clastic sedimentation. This type of sedimentation continued into the Paleogene, when a second major unconformity
developed, interpreted here as a consequence of collision
between a microcontinent and the margin of Sundaland.
The subsequent history of the association can be interpreted
in terms of post-orogenic collapse and dispersal, with early
molasse deposition and, in some cases, later collision with
the advancing Australian Margin around the Banda Arc.
5. Timor
Most discussions of the Outer Banda Arc begin with
Timor, which is logical, since it is the largest and most
intensively studied of the islands, but unfortunate since it
is probably also the most geologically complex (Charlton et
al., 1991a). Moreover, at no time has it been equally easy to
visit both the eastern and the western parts of the island,
which have been described rather differently even in the
most recent publications (Sawyer et al., 1993; Reed et al.,
1996). It is not clear whether the differences stem merely
from different approaches to mapping and interpretation or
reflect real variations in geology.
It is common ground amongst all recent authors that most
of the Mesozoic sediments exposed on Timor are of Australian origin (see discussion in Charlton et al., 1991a). Most
authors also accept the presence on Timor of a forearc,
formerly separated from Australia by an oceanic basin and
referred to by Carter et al. (1976) and Barber (1981) as the

775

allochthon and by Harris et al. (1998) as the Banda

Terrane. Seismic lines across the arc near Timor have
provided striking images of underthrusting by the thickly
sedimented Australian continental margin (Hughes et al.,
1996; Schluter and Fritsch, 1985) and suggest that coherent
slices of the sedimentary cover have in some places been
stripped from the downgoing slab and incorporated in the
overlying collision complexes. In the same terminology,
these continental shelf thrust slices constitute the parautochthon. Both allochthon and parautochthon are now overlain
by post-orogenic sediments of the autochthon, deposited
after collision.
5.1. The allochthon
Charlton et al. (1991a) listed the allochthonous elements
of Timor, of which the most important were the Mutis/Lolotoi Complex, the Palelo Group (Noni, Haulasi and Metan
Formations), the Cablac Limstone and the Ocussi Volcanics. Many authors have drawn attention to parallels
between some of these formations and rocks on Sumba
and Sulawesi. Earle (1983) and Haile et al. (1979) drew
attention to localities in Timor where Noni Formation radiolarian cherts of Late Jurassic or Early Cretaceous age rest
directly on the metamorphics, and to similar occurrences of
this globally unusual pattern in SW Sulawesi. In both cases
the environment of deposition was interpreted as a forearc
basin. Elsewhere, the oldest unmetamorphosed sediments
were considered by Earle (1983) to be the tuffs and agglomerates of the Metan Formation, but these have now been
assigned to the Upper Eocene and Oligocene (Sawyer et
al., 1993.). This discrepancy is some indication of the uncertainty that still surrounds the Palelo Series, an uncertainty
compounded by the strong similarities noted by Sawyer et
al. (1993) between some outcrops normally mapped as
Palelo Group and others mapped as part of the Kolbano
Series. A distinction can, however, be made on the basis
of the presence of volcanic elements throughout the Palelo,
as in similar and coeval rocks on both Sumba and SW
Sulawesi.
The Palelo Group is succeeded unconformably by the
Cablac Limestone and the Ocussi Volcanics. Harris (1992)
considered the latter to be an upthrust part of the Late
Miocene or Pliocene oceanic floor of the Savu Basin.
5.2. The parautochthon
Australian shelf rocks exposed on Timor range in age
from Permian to Paleogene and have been divided into
two main groups, termed the Kekneno and Kolbano series
(Fig. 9a), separated by a hiatus occupying most of the Late
Jurassic (Sawyer et al., 1993). Three distinct Permian
Formations have been recognised, these being the Lower
to Upper Permian Maubisse basalts and limestones, the
Atahoc shales, which interfinger with the Maubisse limestones, and the Upper Permian (or possibly partly Triassic,
Reed et al., 1996) Cribas sands, silts, shales and bioclastic

776

J. Milsom / Journal of Asian Earth Sciences 18 (2000) 761779

130 E
Halmahera
block moves west
to collide with Sangihe Arc

2 oS

Sula Spur collides with the

East Arm of Sulawesi

W Sulawesi
(remnant
collision
orogen)

Buru and Seram move

east from the collision
orogen and rotate

Banda Sea
expands
eastward

6 oS

Sumba moves south

from western Sulawesi

Timor allochthon moves southeast from western Sulawesi

o

134 E
0

200

4 0 0 km

Au s t ralian Sh e lf
As s o c iat io n

1 0 oS

Ban d a
As s o c iat io n

122 E

1 2 6 oE

Su n d alan d Marg in
As s o c iat io n

Fig. 10. Dispersion and amalgamation in eastern Indonesia. The convergence of all three assemblages in Timor is unproven, and not essential to the basic post
orogenic extension hypothesis, but a possibility meriting further investigation.

limestones. The Aileu metamorphics of the north coast are

now recognised as metamorphosed equivalents of some or
all of these formations.
The Triassic of Timor is composed of the Niof Formation,
deposited as gravity flows in a range of water depths, and
later limestones and carbonate muds of the Aitutu Formation. In western but not in eastern Timor, a massive but
probably local sandstone wedge has been given formation
status (Babulu Formation). The top of the Kekneno Series is
represented by the Late TriassicJurassic Wai Luli Formation. In contrast to the other members of the Series, which
are generally confined to the northern mountains, the Wai
Luli is found only in the south.
The Kolbano Series is exposed principally in thrust sheets
in the Kolbano Mountains of southern West Timor. It is not
found in the north and exposures in the east are very limited.
The base of the series is represented by sandstones and
conglomerates of the Lower Cretaceous Oe Baat Formation,
but later sediments (the Nakfunu, Menu and Ofu Formations; Fig. 9a) were deposited in clastic-starved marine
settings which were initially deep but became gradually
shallower in the Tertiary. The younger rocks of Timor are
assigned to either the allochthon or the autochthon.
5.3. Timor controversies
Four major aspects of Timor geology continue to be

controversial. One of these, concerning the relationships

between the various Permian formations, interpreted by
Audley-Charles (1968) as having been deposited in widely
separated areas but by many more recent authors as interfingering (cf. Barber, 1981), has only minor implications for
later orogenic development. More significant is the question
of when orogeny actually occurred. Reed et al. (1996) identified folds in East Timor which pre-dated deposition of the
EarlyMiddle Miocene Cablac Limestone, but Sawyer et al.
(1993) considered the earliest orogenic phase in West Timor
to be Late Miocene. The timing of orogeny in Timor would
have been dictated by the exact shape of the Australian
Margin and would therefore have been diachronous (Harris,
1991) but the time interval suggested above seems too long
to be explained by this factor alone.
Another problem concerns the Kolbano Series, which
Sawyer et al. (1993), following earlier authors, interpreted
as accreted to Timor only in the latest Miocene or Pliocene.
However, paleomagnetic studies by Wensink et al. (1987)
placed the site of deposition of the Lower Cretaceous
Nakfunu Formation at only 20S, and thus more than
1000 km north of the Australian Margin (Smith et al.,
1994). If this paleomagnetic datum is correct, the Nakfunu
must have been deposited on a rifted fragment that drifted
north ahead of the main continent. The fossil evidence is
ambiguous and Clowes (1997) described a radiolarian fauna
of mixed Tethyan and higher latitude affinities. Given strong

J. Milsom / Journal of Asian Earth Sciences 18 (2000) 761779

geological resemblances and the evidence for a pre-Middle

Miocene orogenic event in Timor, it seems unwise to
completely discount the possibility that the Kolbano
belongs with the Banda Association as defined in this paper.
Uncertainty also surrounds the metamorphic rocks. On
the basis of metamorphic grades indicating burial to depths
of more than 20 km, the Lolotoi Complex of East Timor was
originally described as continental basement (e.g. AudleyCharles, 1968), although the importance of basic igneous
rocks was recognised by all early workers. In West Timor
the supposedly equivalent Mutis Complex has been more
intensively studied and comprehensively described, and is
now interpreted as a metamorphic sole overlain by a thrust
mass of variably metamorphosed ophiolitic rocks similar to
the Lamasi Complex of west Sulawesi (Sopaheluwakan et
al., 1989). It is not proven that continental metamorphic
basement outcrops in either West or East Timor.

6. Discussion
Although most aspects of the geological history of eastern
Indonesia are still controversial, there is consensus on a few
important points. It is generally agreed that eastern Sulawesi
and Buton were sutured to western Sulawesi in the Late
Oligocene or Early Miocene and that their later history
has been dominated by extensional and transcurrent faulting. This suturing was regarded as two separate events by
Smith and Silver (1991) but Milsom et al. (1999) have
argued in favour of a single collision. Neogene compression
in Sulawesi has been confined to the north, where the
Celebes Sea is now being subducted beneath the North
Arm and where the Sula Spur collided with the East Arm
in the Pliocene. Further south, Bergman et al. (1996) and
Polve et al. (1997) have independently concluded, on the
basis of detailed geochemical studies, that Neogene volcanism was a consequence of orogenic collapse and extension
rather than of subduction.
It is also generally agreed that Sumba and the related
Timor allochthon are of SE Asian origin and were closely
linked to western Sulawesi throughout the Mesozoic and
Paleogene (Soeria-Atmadja et al., 1998; Wensink, 1997).
It follows that the as yet undated oceanic crust of the Flores
Sea must be Neogene, which provides circumstantal support
for the still controversial Late Neogene dating of the North
and South Banda Basins (Rehault et al., 1994). An almost
inescapable corollary is that the Outer Banda Arc islands of
Buru and Seram, as well as the continental fragments in the
Banda Ridges, were closer to Sulawesi prior to the Late
Miocene than they are today and not further away, as in
many reconstructions (e.g. Silver et al., 1985). The virtually
identical Mesozoic stratigraphies of Buton, Buru and Seram
strongly suggest that they formed part of a single block and,
somewhat more controversially, recent work (e.g. Surono,
1998) suggests that this block included most of East
Sulawesi.

777

In contrast, detailed stratigraphic comparisons argue

against any correlation between these now dispersed fragments and the Sula Spur. Although they share an Australasian origin, there are significant differences in their times,
places and modes of separation. The Sula Spur is closely
related to New Guinea, from which it has been detached
principally by transcurrent faulting. It remained part of
that margin and a site of shallow water sedimentation
until the Cretaceous, and collided with Sulawesi only in
the Pliocene. The rocks of the Banda Association, on the
other hand, were rifted from Gondwanaland in the Jurassic,
drifted north ahead of Australia during the Cretaceous and
collided with the SE Asian Margin at the end of the Oligocene. Their Mesozoic sediments resemble those of the most
distal elements of the present Australian Margin, such as the
Wombat Plateau, but were deposited on metamorphic basement, instead of on older sediments. Direct correlation of
the metamorphics with any known Australian province may
prove impossible, both because of distances involved (the
nearest exposures of metamorphic rocks on the Australian
continent are several hundred kilometres from any plausible
sites of rifting) and because of the later metamorphism associated with Tertiary collision, rifting and uplift.
The stratigraphic relationships outlined in this paper
suggest a Late Neogene history for eastern Indonesia
which is summarised in Fig. 10 and which is directly
comparable to hypotheses now being advanced to explain
the development of the western Tethys extensional basins
shown in Fig. 2. A number of propositions concerning the
process of suturing are suggested by these relationships,
which should be testable by detailed and focussed
programmes of investigation. These are that:
1. The Cretaceous sediments of East Sulawesi are not parts
of the ophiolite sequence but are direct equivalents of the
Cretaceous sediments of Buru, Buton and Seram;
2. The metamorphic rocks on which the Triassic sediments
of Buru, Buton and Seram were deposited are equivalents
of the Pompangeo Schist of eastern Sulawesi;
3. The Wai Luli and Kolbano Series rocks of Timor,
together with similar sediments on Buton, Buru, Seram
and East Sulawesi, were deposited on a microcontinent
which rifted away from the Australian continent in the
Late Jurassic and collided with West Sulawesi in the
mid-Tertiary, and that similar and distinctive faunal
assemblages will be found in all cases;
4. The main collision between the Timor allochthon
(Sunda forearc) and the parautochthon took place
before, and not after, the Middle Miocene;
5. The palaeomagnetic inclinations in the Lower Cretaceous rocks of Buton, Buru, Seram and East Sulawesi
will be similar to those already obtained for the Nakfunu
Formation of Timor; and
6. Triassic palaeomagnetic inclinations of Buton, Buru and
Seram will be similar to those already obtained for the
Meluhu Formation of East Sulawesi.

778

J. Milsom / Journal of Asian Earth Sciences 18 (2000) 761779

In the light of the results of these tests it should be possible to formulate a more detailed, more reliable (and perhaps
completely different) model.

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