A History of Agriculture in India v1.c7.13

v1.c7.13

The crustal movements that gave birth to the Alps have also been responsible for the formation of the Himalayas. The movement that first outlined the belt along which the Himalayas were uplifted may have begun in the Cretaceous times, but such pre-Tertiary movement was probably mild, producing an incipient island arc, and there is little evidence to show that there was any real mountain-building movement before the middle of the Tertiary Period. The gigantic masses of sediments that had been accumulating upon the gradually sinking floor of the Tethys, since the upper Carboniferous, disturbed the gravitative equilibrium of the crust towards the end of the Eocene, when a series of intense mountain-building movements, separated by periods of some quiescence, started, resulting in the uplift of the Himalayas.