The Aravalli Range (also spelled Aravali) is a mountain range in Northern-Western India, running approximately in a south-west direction, starting near Delhi, passing through southern Haryana, Rajasthan, and ending in Ahmedabad Gujarat. The highest peak is Guru Shikhar on Mount Abu at . The Aravalli Range is arguably the oldest geological feature on Earth, having its origin in the Proterozoic era. The Aravalli Range is rich in natural resources and serves as check to the growth of the western desert. Etymology Aravalli, a composite Sanskrit word from the roots "ara" and "vali", literally means the "line of peaks". Natural history Geology The Aravalli Range, an eroded stub of ancient mountains, is believed to be the oldest range of fold mountains in India. The natural history of the Aravalli Range dates back to times when the Indian Plate was separated from the Eurasian Plate by an ocean. The Proterozoic Aravalli-Delhi orogenic belt in northwest India is similar to the younger Himalayan-type orogenic belts of the Mesozoic-Cenozoic era (of the Phanerozoic) in terms of component parts and appears to have passed through a near-orderly Wilson supercontinental cycle of events. The range rose in a Precambrian event called the Aravalli-Delhi Orogen. The Aravalli Range is a northeast–southwest trending orogenic belt located in the northwestern part of Indian Peninsula. It is part of the Indian Shield that formed from a series of cratonic collisions. In ancient times, Aravalli were extremely high but since have worn down almost completely from millions of years of weathering, whereas the Himalayas, young fold mountains, are still continuously rising. Aravalli have stopped growing higher due to the cessation of upward thrust caused by the tectonic plates in the Earth's crust below them. The Aravalli Range joins two of the ancient earth's crust segments that make up the greater Indian craton, the Aravalli Craton which is the Marwar segment of earth's crust to the northwest of the Aravalli Range, and the Bundelkand Craton segment of the earth's crust to the southeast of the Aravalli Range. Cratons, generally found in the interiors of tectonic plates, are old and stable parts of the continental lithosphere that have remained relatively undeformed during the cycles of merging and rifting of continents. It consists of two main sequences formed in the Proterozoic eon, metasedimentary rock (sedimentary rocks metamorphosed under pressure and heat without melting) and metavolcanic rock (metamorphosed volcanic rocks) sequences of the Aravalli Supergroup