Abstract In various ancient authors (e.g. the ‘Argonautika’ of Apollonios Rhodios) curious news about the Island of Elba can be found, concerning the existence, somewhere on the shore near Portoferraio, of pebbles that are ‘dirty’ from the Argonauts’ sweat. The Argonauts are said to have stopped on the island during their journey back from the looting of the ‘Golden Fleece’. These pebbles are found to be typical of the gravelly beaches below the Capo Bianco cliffs. Such walls are made up of a bony-white aplitic rock dotted with blue-black tourmaline spots. Capo Bianco aplite is the uncommon result of the solidification of a boron-rich magma in a subvolcanic setting. Here, the separation of a boron-rich fluid phase gave way to the crystallization of peculiar spherical dark tourmaline clots in a very fine-grained white groundmass. This rock was noted by Argonauts (i.e. the ancient travellers they represent) and used as a lighthouse to the harbour of Argoos limen (now Portoferraio). Also in the myth, the unique mottled pebbles were recorded as stained by the Argonauts’ sweat. The occurrence, within the same, complex myth, of ‘data’ concerning navigation (the white cliffs) and geology (description of the spotted aplite) identify the Argonauts as a blending of mineral prospectors, explorers and early eighteenth century-like naturalists, legitimatizing the commercial/political presence of Greeks in the region.

Abstract Alba is a heavy oil (19 –20° API) field discovered in 1984 and brought on production in 1994. The oil is reservoired within middle Eocene turbiditic sands deposited within hemipelagic background argillaceous sediments. Alba sands have been subjected to postdepositional remobilization and sand injection on a field- wide scale. Sand geometries are highly complex. Prediction of sand-shale lithology from the Alba field four-component Ocean Bottom Cable seismic data set is refined through detailed horizontal and vertical well-seismic integration. Reservoir sands are subdivided into remobilized or injected and depositional facies in all wells by recognition in cores and/or logging-while-drilling response and by elastic impedance seismic character. An abundance of multiple horizontal well sidetrack data (commonly in the same vertical plane) in the Alba field allows the construction of facies cross sections against a seismic impedance data backdrop with some confidence. A new, threedimensional (3-D) geomodeling software is used that can directly include these facies cross sections as constraints on geomodeling, in addition to conventional well and seismic data constraints. This allows a degree of geological interpretation to be imposed and supported with outcrop analogs within the uncertainties of the available data. Numerous equiprobable 3-D cellular geomodel possibilities are created that differentiate remobilized or injected reservoir facies from depositional reservoir facies. The impacts of facies variability on production profiles are tested in a streamline reservoir simulator at the geological model scale.

Abstract Thermal ionization mass spectrometry (TIMS) and SHRIMP U-Pb zircon dating techniques were employed in this study to obtain intrusion ages and information on xenocrystic zircon from granitoid rocks of the Bathurst Mining Camp, New Brunswick. Emplacement ages were obtained for the South Little River Lake (470 ± 3 Ma), Sweat Hill (476 ± 20 Ma), Mullin Stream Lake (465 ± 3 Ma), Serpentine River (466 ± 2 Ma (min)), and South Renous River (469 ± 7 Ma) plutons. Published U-Pb ages for calc-alkalic felsic volcanic formations of the Bathurst Mining Camp indicate that volcanism occurred between 472 and 466 Ma; units hosting the volcanogenic massive sulfide (VMS) deposits are ca. 472 Ma. Within analytical error, our ages for the South Little River and Sweat Hill plutons, along with previously published ages for the Popple Depot (474 ± 4 Ma), Meridian Brook (472.3 ± 4 Ma), and Sweat Hill plutons (476 Ma) overlap VMS deposit formation. The Mullin Stream Lake and Serpentine River plutons are most likely younger than the VMS-related volcanic formations.