Mesozoic • Cretaceous formation Literature

Tupop Formation

Late Cretaceous

Karakoram-Hindukush Basin · Central Karakoram Batholith

Cited in 2 sources Last reviewed Jul 31, 2026

Unit summary

Rank: formation
Status: Published
Age: Mesozoic · Cretaceous · Late CretaceousLate Cretaceous
Named by: Gaetani et al. (1990a)
Type locality: Widely exposed west and south of Babaghundi Ziarat in the Chapursan Valley, along the Buattar valley and northward up the Irshad Uwin Valley (Sost Unit).
Thickness: Not recorded
Lithology: Channelized red cobble–pebble conglomerates in amalgamated several-metre beds interbedded with sandstone and red shales; usually clast-supported with carbonate cement, clasts predominantly carbonate with subordinate terrigenous and few volcanic clasts. Basal rhyolitic ignimbrites (top of the Hidden Gorge) and a ~10 m dark red ignimbrite occur locally.
Synonyms: Not recorded

The Tupop Formation is a Late Cretaceous fluviatile red-conglomerate unit of the Chapursan Valley area (Sost Unit, Karakoram). It consists of channelised, clast-supported red cobble–pebble conglomerates with sandstone and red-shale interbeds and local basal rhyolitic ignimbrites; no fossils were found, so its age rests on regional correlation. It unconformably covers the Triassic Aghil Formation carbonates and is in turn unconformably overlain by the Campanian marls of the Darband Formation — the Reshun/Tupop unconformity marking an important Karakoram deformational event.

Fossils

Not recorded

Contacts

Lower contact — unconformable; upper contact — unconformable.

In the Hindukush-Chitral column

ConglomerateLimestoneSandstoneFossils recordedContact not recordedUnconformity

Band colour = period; texture = dominant rock type. Lines between bands mark the contact type; dotted = no contact recorded in the sources (not a claim of conformity). True scale makes height ∝ recorded thickness; hatched = thickness not recorded. Ages approximate, for ordering.

This unit (highlighted) within its province column; faded ends continue above and below. Line style marks the contact type.

Distribution & setting

Hindukush-Chitral

Basin: Karakoram-Hindukush Basin
Region: Central Karakoram Batholith
Depositional environment: fluvial, continental
Coordinates: Not recorded

Correlation

Not recorded. Compare this unit against other basins on the correlation panel →

Economic significance

Not recorded

Remarks

A Late Cretaceous fluviatile red-conglomerate unit (age by correlation to the Chapursan Valley; no fossils found) that unconformably covers the Triassic Aghil Formation carbonates and is in turn unconformably covered by the Campanian marls of the Darband Formation. The Reshun/Tupop unconformity marks an important deformational event in the Karakoram.

Research notes (1)

Field-by-field findings drawn from the cited literature. Every statement is traced to a registered source — follow a citation for the full reference.

Age & correlation (1)

Kazmi & Abbasi (2008) CORROBORATES the curated Cretaceous age: the Tupop Conglomerate (Gaetani et al. 1993; Kundil and Borom tributaries of the lower Chapursan Valley, upper Hunza) is a thick lithic conglomerate with clasts of limestone, sandstone, quartzite and felsic volcanics plus reworked Permian fusulinids and echinoderm fragments; it lacks age-diagnostic fossils but is bracketed (angular unconformities) between a Jurassic–Early Cretaceous sequence below and the Late Cretaceous (Campanian–early Maastrichtian) ~300 m Darband Formation above, giving an inferred Cretaceous age. The book calls it a 'conglomerate' rather than a 'formation'.

Kazmi, A.H. & Abbasi, I.A. (2008)

Sources (3)

Zanchi, A. & Gaetani, M. (2011). The geology of the Karakoram Range, Pakistan. Italian Journal of Geosciences, 130(2), 161-262.
Zanchi, A. & Gaetani, M. (2011). The geology of the Karakoram range, Pakistan: the new 1:100,000 geological map of Central-Western Karakoram. Italian Journal of Geosciences, 130(2), 161-262.
Kazmi, A.H. & Abbasi, I.A. (2008). Stratigraphy and Historical Geology of Pakistan. Department & National Centre of Excellence in Geology, University of Peshawar, Peshawar. 524 pp. ISBN 978-969-9119.

Every fact on this page is source-cited. This entry is part of the peer-archived Pakistan Stratigraphy Dataset (doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.21363991, CC‑BY‑4.0).

Lexicon status: Defined in journal or other literature; not found in a GSP memoir. There is no body currently ratifying unit status, so provenance is shown in place of a formal ruling.

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Cite this unit

APA

Qudsi, L. (2026). Tupop Formation. In Pakistan Stratigraphy Dataset [Data set]. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.21363991

BibTeX

@misc{stratigraphypk_tupopformation,
  author    = {Qudsi, Lareb},
  title     = {{Tupop Formation} --- Pakistan Stratigraphy Dataset},
  year      = {2026},
  publisher = {Zenodo},
  doi       = {10.5281/zenodo.21363991},
  url       = {https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.21363991}
}

Archived dataset: doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.21363991 (CC‑BY‑4.0) · Direct link to this entry: https://stratigraphy.pk/formation/tupop-formation (accessed October 29, 2026).

To cite the unit's original definition instead, see: Gaetani et al. (1990a).

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