Abstract The structural evolution of southern Mexico is described in the context of its plate tectonic evolution and illustrated by two restored crustal scale cross-sections through Cuicateco and the Veracruz Basin and a third across Chiapas. We interpret the Late Jurassic–Early Cretaceous opening of an oblique hyper-stretched intra-arc basin between the Cuicateco Belt and Oaxaca Block of southern Mexico where Lower Cretaceous deep-water sediments accumulated. These rocks, together with the hyper-stretched basement beneath them and the Oaxaca Block originally west of them, were thrust onto the Cretaceous platform of the Cuicateco region during a Late Cretaceous–Eocene orogenic event. The mylonitic complex of the Sierra de Juárez represents this hyper-stretched basement, perhaps itself an extensional allochthon. The Chiapas fold-and-thrust belt is mainly Neogene in age. Shallowing of the subduction angle of the Cocos Plate in the wake of the Chortis Block, suggested by seismicity and migrating arc volcanism, is thought to play an important role in the development of the Chiapas fold-and-thrust belt itself, helping to explain the structural dilemma of a vertical transcurrent plate boundary fault (the Tonalá Fault) at the back of an essentially dip-slip fold-and-thrust belt.

Abstract Throughout the nineteenth century, geological research in Mexico was conducted by various actors, including scientific travellers, mining entrepreneurs, civil servants, scientists and amateur geologists. They explored vast swaths of Mexican territory, producing maps and writing articles and books about its geological constitution. However, it was not until the last third of the nineteenth century that any official attempt was made to put together a national geological survey. The French Expedition (1864–67) was the first to assert the need for a general geological map. Later, the Mexican Geological Commission was established in 1888 during the Porfirio Díaz administration. A couple of years later, the first general geological map was finally ready. Research then continued to grow and prosper under the auspices of the National Geological Institute, founded in 1891.