The aetiology of the neotectonic evolution of Turkey

The neotectonics of Turkey comprises a time slice since about the end of the Oligocene and has been dominated by the shortening of Eastern Turkey, which created the Turkish–Iranian high plateau, extension in western Turkey, which created the Aegean Sea and the basin-and-range system of western Anatolia and the escape westward from the converging jaws of Arabia and Eurasia along the North and East Anatolian transform faults onto the Hellenic/Cypriot subduction zone. The escape of Turkey along the North and East Anatolian Faults began when eastern Turkey was still at subsea level, while western Turkey was a high plateau of some 3 km elevation. These inferences make it unlikely that the gravitational potential of the Turkish–Iranian Plateau initiated the escape. The pull of the Hellenic/Cypriot subduction system seems influential in western Turkey, but not necessarily in creating the escape regime. The high topography in eastern Turkey developed gradually between the Serravallian and the present coevally as western Turkey lost elevation, which probably aided in accelerating the rate of the escape.