Abstract
The Xiangshuyuan Formation (middle Rhuddanian to middle Aeronian stages of the Llandovery Series, lower Silurian) records a shelly fauna representing recovery after the end‐Ordovician mass extinction in a well‐oxygenated shallow carbonate platform of the Upper Yangtze region, South China Block. Carbon isotope stratigraphy is documented from limestone sequences of the formation at the Qiankou section, northeast Guizhou. The early Aeronian carbon isotope excursion (EACIE, with an amplitude of about 2 ‰ and peak value of 2.44 ‰) is identified in the middle and upper parts of the formation ( Ozarkodina obesa conodont Biozone). The EACIE recorded herein correlates well with those in Baltica, Canada, and the United States; together with its records from organic material (δ 13 C org ) the data verify that the EACIE is a global event. The beginning of the EACIE can be used as a chemostratigraphic marker defining the Rhuddanian/Aeronian boundary in strata that lack high‐resolution biostratigraphic constraints.