Pericratonic Depression

a flexure in the earths crust on the periphery of a platform. The depression has one side bordering on a geosyncline and has experienced prolonged and extreme subsidence, with the accumulation of sediment up to 12 km thick. The strata of sediment are related to platform formations and undergo relatively mild folding and faulting. Examples include the Angara-Lena pericratonic depression of the Siberian Platform and the Vistula-Dnestr pericratonic depression of the Eastern European Platform. The term was proposed in 1959 by the Soviet geologist E. V. Pavlovskii.