Abstract

Up to now, the widely used Mesozoic and Cenozoic chronostratigraphy of Belize has been based upon estimations and assumptions made by geological pioneers working in that country decades ago. During the 1950s, Giovanni Flores and C. G. Dixon, working independently, studied and named most of the informal, post-Paleozoic lithostratigraphy of the former English colony (British Honduras). In so doing, Flores (working in the northern [Corozal] basin), and Dixon (working in the southern [Belize] basin), made age estimates for all the known lithostratigraphic units of Belize. These age estimates were thought to be reasonable at the time, and for the past ∼60 years that chronostratigraphy has been repeated without further significant investigation in government and corporate reports, on geological maps, and in most published papers. Since 2003, the Auburn research group has produced a series of papers addressing the sedimentology, stratigraphy, and depositional environments of nearly all the formations of northern Belize, plus the Toledo formation of southern Belize. Further, since 2018, the Auburn research group has provided newly revised ages of many of the lithostratigraphic units within both Belize basins. In this paper, we present a proposed revision of the Mesozoic and Cenozoic chronostratigraphy of Belize, particularly northern Belize, and we note where additional stratigraphic work is needed.