The Tartoq greenstone belt of southwest Greenland represents a well-preserved section through >3 Ga old oceanic crust and has the potential to provide important constraints on the composition and geodynamics of the Archaean crust. Based on a detailed structural examination, it has been proposed that the belt records an early style of horizontal convergent plate tectonics where elevated temperatures, compared to the modern-day, led to repeated aborted subduction and tonalite–trondhjemite–granodiorite (TTG) type melt formation. This interpretation hinges on pressure–temperature (P–T) constraints for the belt, for which only preliminary estimates are currently available. Here, we present a detailed study of the pressure–temperature conditions and metamorphic histories for rocks from all fragments of the Tartoq belt using pseudosection modelling and geothermobarometry. We show that peak conditions are predominantly amphibolite facies, but range from 450 to 800 °C at up to 7.5 kbar; reaching anatexis with formation of TTG-type partial melts in the Bikuben segment. Emplacement of the Tartoq segments into the host TTG gneisses took place at approximately 3 Ga at 450–500 °C and 4 kbar as constrained from actinolite–chlorite–epidote–titanite–quartz parageneses, and was followed by extensive hydrothermal retrogression related to formation of shear zone-hosted gold mineralisation. Tourmaline thermometry and retrograde assemblages in mafic and ultramafic lithologies constrain this event to 380 ± 50 °C at a pressure below 1 kbar. Our results show that the convergent tectonics recorded by the Tartoq belt took place at a P–T gradient markedly shallower than that of modern-day subduction, resulting in a hot, weak and buoyant slab unable to generate and transfer ‘slab pull’, nor sustain a single continuous downgoing slab. The Tartoq belt suggests that convergence was instead accomplished by under-stacking of slabs from repeated aborted subduction. The shallow P–T path combined with thermal relaxation following subduction stalling subsequently resulted in partial melting and formation of TTG melts.

The medieval city of Vlaardingen (the Netherlands) was strategically located on the confluence of three rivers, the Maas, the Merwede, and the Vlaarding. A church of the early 8th century AD was already located here. In a short period of time, Vlaardingen developed in the 11th century AD into an international trading place and into one of the most important places in the former county of Holland. Starting from the 11th century AD, the river Maas repeatedly threatened to flood the settlement. The flood dynamics were registered in Fluvisol archives and were recognised in a multidisciplinary sedimentary analysis of these archives. To secure the future of these vulnerable soil archives an extensive interdisciplinary research effort (76 mechanical drill holes, grain size analysis (GSA), thermo-gravimetric analysis (TGA), archaeological remains, soil analysis, dating methods, micromorphology, and microfauna) started in 2011 to gain knowledge on the sedimentological and pedological subsurface of the settlement mound as well as on the well-preserved nature of the archaeological evidence. Pedogenic features are recorded with soil description, micromorphological, and geochemical (XRF – X-ray fluorescence) analysis. The soil sequence of 5 m thickness exhibits a complex mix of "natural" as well as "anthropogenic" layering and initial soil formation that enables us to make a distinction between relatively stable periods and periods with active sedimentation. In this paper the results of this interdisciplinary project are demonstrated in a number of cross-sections with interrelated geological, pedological, and archaeological stratification. A distinction between natural and anthropogenic layering is made on the basis of the occurrence of the chemical elements phosphor and potassium. A series of four stratigraphic and sedimentary units record the period before and after the flooding disaster. Given the many archaeological remnants and features present in the lower units, in geological terms it is assumed that the medieval landscape was submerged while it was inhabited in the 12th century AD. In reaction to a final submersion phase in the late 12th century AD, the inhabitants started to raise the surface of the settlement. Within archaeological terms the boundary between natural and anthropogenic layers is stratigraphically lower, so that in the interpretation of archaeologists, the living ground was dry during the 12th and the 13th centuries AD. In this discussion, the geological interpretation will be compared with alternative archaeological scenarios.

The new biotite activity model and standard-state thermodynamic properties of Ann, Phl, and Eas presented in part-I were used to make pseudosections of bulk compositions representing experimental Fe–Mg exchange equilibria and (model) pelitic bulk rock compositions in the system K₂O–FeO–MgO–Al₂O₃–SiO₂–H₂O (KFMASH), using mainly the software Perple_X. These pseudosection calculations (termed ‘our calculation(s)’ in the following) were compared to analogous ones performed with the solution model of biotite and thermodynamic data cited in White et al. (J Metamorph Geol 32:261–286, 2014, 10.1111/jmg.12071), termed ‘W14 calculation’. Our calculations with the experimental bulk composition used by Zhou (Ti–Mg–Fe biotites: formation, substitution, and thermodynamic properties at 650 to 900 °C and 1.1 Kb with fO₂ defined by the CH₄–graphite buffer. PhD thesis, State University of New York, 1994) in his experimental study of the Fe–Mg exchange between biotite (Bt) and olivine (Ol) confirm that biotite had no or only minimal octahedral Al (Al^VI) in these experiments. The experimental data of Ferry and Spear (—FS78, Contrib Mineral Petrol 66:113–117, 1978, 10.1007/BF00372150) on the Fe–Mg distribution between biotite and garnet (Grt) are well reproduced by our calculations. The computed composition of biotite (X_Fe) in equilibrium with garnet of Alm₉₀Py₁₀ composition and the resulting lnK_D values as a function of temperature are in good agreement with the experimental brackets. An analogous W14 calculation on the same Fe-rich bulk composition predicts too high X_Fe^Bt in order of 0.1 mol fraction. The Al^VI contents of biotite of about 0.3–0.45 apfu, as measured by Gessman et al. (Am Mineral 82:1225–1240, 1997, 10.2138/am-1997-11-1218) in similar biotite–garnet exchange experiments performed with Alm₈₀Py₂₀ and Alm₇₀Py₃₀ garnets, are well reproduced by our, as well as by W14 calculations. The extent of Tschermak substitution in biotite in the FS78 experiments, which had Fe-richer bulk compositions, has not been measured. Comparing the FS78 biotites with the ones from Gessman et al. (Am Mineral 82:1225–1240, 1997, 10.2138/am-1997-11-1218), it is very likely that the biotites reported in FS78 contained Al^VI in the same order of ca. 0.3–0.4 apfu. A T–X_Fe (= molar FeO/(FeO + MgO) pseudosection demonstrates the bulk composition dependence of lnK_D of the Mg/Fe^Grt/Bt exchange reaction in high-variance fields. Further comparisons, demonstrating the application of the new biotite solution model in the KFMASH system, are presented in pseudosections constructed for an average model pelite, as well as for a natural high-T/low-P and a natural high-P metapelite. The pseudosections show that biotite according to our biotite model breaks down at lower temperatures and pressures than predicted from the W14 biotite model in the KFMASH system. This means that KFMASH biotite can break down before the wet solidus is reached, which can explain the existence of dry high-T/low-P metapelites. At higher pressures, biotite according to our calculations breaks down at lower pressures than computed with the W14 biotite model. Before biotite breaks down, however, its Al^VI content based on our calculations could potentially be used for pseudosection barometry, similarly as the Si-in-phengite barometer. These trends need to be confirmed by a future extension of our model which incorporates Ti, Fe³⁺ and a di–tri-octahedral substitution.