Greywacke zone

The greywacke zone lies between the Central Alps and the Northern Limestone Alps. The mostly dark rocks have been folded once in the Variscan orogeny and then a second time at the Alpine development.

The greywacke zone attracts a narrow strip of Palaeozoic rocks from the Arlberg through the Upper Inn Valley, then widens in the field of Tux, the Kitzbühel Alps and the Salzburg Slate Alps - this wider portion is called Slate Alps - up to the Dachstein stick to in the Enns Valley back to a very small width converge. In the Alps Eisenerzer they again reached a larger width to leak and then by the Muerztal and the Semmering to Vienna Basin ( Ternitz ).

But in the strict sense only subordinate occurring - - As mountain -forming material here also weakly metamorphosed limestones ( marbles ), quartzites and the eponymous are phyllites, slate, metamorphic volcanic rocks, greywacke dominant. The greywacke zone is rich in mineral resources (iron, copper, magnesite, graphite, etc. ). Due to the mostly soft rock, the mountains are mostly rounded, gentle knolls with little forest cover, which are attractive for alpine skiing. Geologically, the greywacke zone has formed in the folding of the Alps from the seabed of the Ur - Mediterranean Tethys, while the deposited thereon limestones form the poles, karst plateaus or walls of the Limestone Alps located. The greywacke zone belongs to the Austroalpine ceiling.

The rock stock is stratigraphically simplified as follows ( between Arlberg and Semmering there are of course many differences ):

• Ordovician: slate, phyllite, meta- conglomerates and metamorphic volcanic rocks - especially the widespread Blasseneck - Porphyroid. Significant peaks from west to east, for example Gampenkogel and Steinbergkogel (both Kitzbühel Alps ), Blaseneck ( Blasseneck ) and Leoben (both Eisenerzer Alps)
• Silurian: slate, phyllite, greenschist ( metamorphic volcanic rocks ), greywacke and weakly metamorphosed limestones. Significant peaks eg Geißstein, Hundstein
• Devon: v. a metamorphic limestones, often metalliferous such as at Erzberg, Mitterberg in Mühlbach and in Schwaz. Significant peaks from west to east: eg Gratlspitze, Big Rettenstein, Kitzbühel Horn, Wildseeloder, Spielberghorn, Zeiritzkampel, game field, Eisenerzer rich stone, upholstery, Gößeck ( Reiting ), Turn Taler Kogel
• Carbon: slate, phyllite and weakly metamorphosed limestones, partly magnesitführend as in Sunk in shoots and in Veitsch

In places, for example in the Carnic Alps also occurs in the south of the Central Alps a southern Grauwackenzone in appearance.