The crystalline basement within the northern parts of the Caledonian orogen, and in the adjacent foreland, is overlain by a several-kilometer-thick succession of sedimentary and volcanic rocks, the Paleoproterozoic–Mesoproterozoic Independence Fjord Group and the Mesoproterozoic Zig-Zag Dal Basalt Formation. The lowermost strata of the Independence Fjord Group, composed of quartzitic and feldspathic sandstones and conglomerates with interbedded volcanic rocks, occur within the Caledonian orogen and are strongly deformed. These strata were deposited around 1740 Ma ago, and they were associated with a period of rifting that succeeded a long sequence of Paleoproterozoic orogenic events. Similar sandstones, interbedded with siltstone units...