Abstract
The history of the petrological study of the Sanbagawa metamorphic belt is reviewed. The review is mainly concerned with the change of view points of petrological study, but not much to looking back to the history of nomenclature.
A great deal of hard work had been don e to accumulate petrological data of the Sanbagawa belt from 1930's to 1950's, notably by J. Suzuki, G. Horikoshi and G. Kojima. The view point that metamorphism was nothing but a physico-chemical process in the crust of the earth, and had to be studied accordingly, was, however, introduced by A. Miyashiro in 1950's. The works stimulated by Miyashiro's philosophy, notably by A. Miyashiro himself, Y. Seki, M. Iwasaki, S. Banno and W. G. Ernst had clarified the basic feature of the petrology of the Sanbagawa belt before 1970. From 1970, an extensive use of electron-probe microanalyzer to study the solid solution of rock-forming minerals opened a new field, in which the thermal history of a glaucophanitic metamorphic belt is being discussed by a group of petrologists belonging to a younger generation.
