1985 Volume 80 Issue 10 Pages 413-428
The Ashidachi ultramafic complex, highly serpentinized, is emplaced into the prehnite-pumpellyite grade rocks in the Sangun metamorphic belt, Japan. A number of small gabbroic bodies enclosed in the serpentinite are ubiquitously rodingitized along their margins. Progressive chemical change of rodingite zone indicates introduction of CaO from ultramafic rocks. Selected serpentinites, derived from clinopyroxene-bearing harzburgitic peridotite, were nalyzed for CaO content and density. The relationship between the CaO content and density suggests that the serpentinization proceeded, at least, in two different reaction steps; an early step of serpentiniza-tion occurred without much loss of CaO, whereas in a later step CaO was depleted to a significant extent. The depletion rate of CaO in the later step of serpentinization is ascribed to the olivine-clinopyroxene decomposition reaction. Ca-OH type fluids roduced by the reaction are respon-sible for the rodingite formation. The Ca-OH type fluids, essentially incompatible with a CO2 component, are in harmony with the fact that rodingite minerals typically are suggestive of CO2-poor fluids. Such CO2-poor metasomatic fluids might have been produced as well as maintained by the CO2-buffering fluid regimes of the serpentinization with formation of talc-carbonate selvages under the regional metamorphism of the Sangun belt.