The accumulation of a large database on the timing and kinematics of late Cenozoic deformation in the Death Valley region of southeastern California indicates a complex three-dimensional history. On the basis of paleogeographic reconstructions we suggest the system was initiated as a localized pull-apart between two conjugate strike-slip faults, the Garlock and Furnace Creek faults, and evolved into a system characterized by distributed transtension related to the eastern California shear zone. Our reconstructions differ from previous models in the incorporation of significant vertical axis rotations of a number of crustal blocks to explain paleomagnetic data from the region. The model may resolve (1) a long-standing problem of the eastern termination of the Garlock fault which is explained here as a complex system of splays that initially terminated in the pull-apart between the Furnace Creek and Garlock systems; and (2) the complex architecture of the Black Mountains which is explained here in terms of initial extreme attenuation between the Garlock and Furnace Creek systems with overprinting by a fold and normal fault system that operated simultaneously as a result of distributed transtension. This model suggests much of the displacement field is taken up in rotations and translations, and the actual crustal thinning in our model is relatively small (50--66% of original thickness). ¿ American Geophysical Union 1996