Elan Bank extends westward from the boundary between the central and southern Kerguelen Plateau. Gneissic metamorphic and felsic igneous clasts recovered from the primarily basaltic basement complex at ODP Site 1137 on the bank reveal its continental origins. The margins of the bank are characterised by massive lava flows and highly reflective layered crust at its base. These volcanics have obvious similarities with volcanic sequences identified on volcanic passive margins (e.g., the Wallaby and Exmouth plateaus off Western Australia). The volcanic sequences on Elan Bank may have formed either during the (?) Valanginian breakup of India/Elan Bank and Antarctica, or during later Albian breakup of India and Elan Bank, when the bank was probably transferred from the Indian plate to the Antarctic plate via a ridge jump. In either case, massive Albian volcanism overprinted and radically altered the continental sliver forming the core of the Elan Bank.