New geologic mapping, 40Ar/39Ar thermochronometry, and geobarometry in the Middle Eocene Priest River metamorphic core complex provide the basis for unraveling the role of en echelon fault systems in core complex formation and for determining the scale of crustal fragments that form during continental extension. Four faults occur in the Priest River complex. The east verging Purcell Trench fault zone on the eastern side consists of two distinct en echelon fault segments separated by an unfaulted homocline. The U-shaped Newport fault system on the northwestern side is a conjugate normal fault set. The west verging eastern Newport fault terminates within the Silver Point Wrencoe pluton, which was intruded syntectonically into the fault zone. The east verging western Newport fault merges with the east verging Spokane dome mylonite zone in the underlying infrastructure. New geobarometric data show that this midcrustal shear zone, which evidently forms part of the regional basal d¿collement of the Cordilleran fold and thrust belt, also records significant Eocene extensional shearing. Rocks that formed beneath the mylonite zone at a depth of 30--35 km are juxtaposed against rocks that formed at a depth of 10 km above the zone. Eocene 40Ar/39Ar chrontours in the southern part of the infrastructure record progressive exhumation and quenching that becomes younger eastward. In the northern fragment of the infrastructure, alternating domains of progressive westward exhumation/quenching and progressive eastward exhumation/quenching occur beneath the eastern Newport fault and the northern Purcell Trench fault, respectively. These relationships form the basis for a new model of the evolution of the Priest River complex. The southern part of the infrastructure was exhumed by a major east verging detachment system comprising the western Newport fault and the reactivated eastern part of the Spokane dome mylonite zone, into which the western Newport fault merges. This master detachment fault, which roots in the southern Purcell Trench on the east side of the core complex, plunges beneath the northern part of the infrastructure (the Selkirk Crest block). Below the detachment, the infrastructure appears to be intact; above the detachment, the crust extended along a set of relaying conjugate detachment faults. These faults are the eastern Newport fault and the north and south Purcell Trench faults. Kinematic analysis shows that the Selkirk Crest block is a crustal-scale extensional horse that was stranded as continued extension moved the underlying metamorphic infrastructure out from beneath it and toward the west along the master detachment. This study shows that large tracts of midcrustal rocks can be translated and stranded as allochthonous fragments during continental crustal extension. ¿ 1999 American Geophysical Union