| Summary: | The oldest rocks in Finland are the Archaean grey gneisses of eastern and northern Finland. The Archaean of the Karelian craton spans about 1000 Ma of crustal growth and evolution and forms the core of the Fennoscandian shield. The Karelian province is a complex patchwork of different rock types. The individual formations are of small territorial extent in accordance with often postulated small Archaean plates. Overall, the Karelian craton is a granitoid-greenstone terrain with prevailing TTGs and younger granites, which show increasing level of potassium. The craton also includes a distinct sodic variety of granites that combines features of classical Archaean TTGs and late Archaean high-K granites. A minor number of Mg-rich lithologic units, including adakites and sanukitoids, are reported as well. A small number of A-type granites, syenites and S-type granites are widely distributed and of local nature only. Peculiarly, a large number of TTGs is peraluminous. The formation of Karelian craton may be explained by accretion of small plates, perhaps during the late Archaean supercraton event in a process that at least in later stages included active plate marginal processes.
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