The Ashanti belt of Ghana is the key district of gold mineralisation in the Palaeoproterozoic terrane of West Africa. The area considered is covered by lithologies of the volcanic/sedimentary Birimian Supergroup (2.2-2 1 Ga) and the overlying Tarkwaian Group (<2132 Ma). Birimian and Tarkwaian rocks were jointly folded and metamorphosed under greenschist facies conditions during a single progressive deformation, the Eburnean tectono-thermal event or orogeny at about 2.1 Ga. Regional foliation and subparallel shear zones hosting mesothermal gold mineralisation developed during deformation coeval with metamorphism.