Abstract

Pernambuco lies on bedrocks of the eastern sector of the Borborema Province, which consists of a collage of metamorphic terrains and plutonic intrusions related to the Brasiliana Orogeny (900–570 Ma) and the formation of the West Gondwana continent. The area is characterized by the predominance of crystalline lithologies separated by NE- SW and E-W shear zones. Phanerozoic sedimentary basins overlie the Proterozoic basement as a result of the platformization that followed the Brasiliana Orogeny and the opening of the South Atlantic in the upper Cretaceous. The up-warping of the passive oceanic margin that preceded the opening of the Atlantic and continued during the Paleogene and part of the Neogene resulted in the distribution of the morphostructures that make up the relief of Pernambuco. The accumulation landforms reflect the morphogenetic processes of the coastal humid tropical climate and the inland semi-arid, corresponding to continuous or fragmented alluvial plains and terraces according to the discharge regime, that varies from perennial to ephemeral. Overall, the morphological units are distributed as a succession of “stepped” surfaces starting from the coast, increasing in elevation to 1200 m on the line that establishes the regional divide between the drainages that run to the Atlantic and those that flow west and southwest toward to the São Francisco River about 300 km inland