Do Volcanism and Mineralization in The Timok Magmatic Complex (East Serbia) Begin Earlier Than Previously Thought?

What we know so far about the development of the Timok Magmatic Complex (TMC) after almost 150 years of research and 120 years since the discovery of copper mineralization in Bor (eastern Serbia) is that volcanism in the TMC developed at the beginning of the Upper Cretaceous on the continental crust of Paleozoic to Lower Cretaceous age. The TMC belongs to the Late Cretaceous Apuseni-Banat-Timok-Srednogorje Belt (ABTS) and together belong to the transcontinental Tethyan-Eurasian Metallogenic Belt. The Upper Cretaceous rocks of the TMC consist of volcanic/magmatic, volcanogenic-sedimentary and sedimentary rock packages. Magmatism/volcanism occurred in at least two phases from the Upper Turonian to the Upper Campanian: I volcanic phase - V1 (90-82 Ma), II volcanic phase - V2 (83-78 Ma), with a constant decrease in age from east to west. The most significant epithermal and porphyry mineralization, in the world-famous copper deposits (Majdanpek, Bor, Veliki Krivelj, Cukaru Peki), is related to the volcanic phase V1, which is predominantly developed in the easternmost part of the TMC and developed between 87-80 Ma. However, recent exploration drill holes conducted for the purpose of exploring for strategic mineral resources south of Bor, in their deeper intervals, have drilled, in a normal stratigraphic succession, clastic sediments of Albian-Cenomanian age. These clastics are intruded by hornblende andesites that are believed to belong to the V1 volcanic phase, and that according to preliminary data are about 92-90 Ma old. All of the above data are more or less known to the wider geological public, however, what is unusual in the composition of the Albian-Cenomanian sediments and so far, unrecorded is the presence of fresh to slightly altered andesite and basaltic andesite fragments, which according to their macroscopic characteristics have not been recorded so far on the surface or in exploration drill holes in the TMC. Does the occurrence of these clasts in the sediments that are significantly older than all previously recorded volcanics mean that magmatism/volcanism in the TMC began significantly earlier than previously thought, probably in the Albian-Cenomanian? We will certainly seek answers to these questions in future specialized geological investigations and perhaps initiate new thinking about the geodynamic development of the TMC.