This study carried out rare earth elements analysis and U- Pb chronology dating respectively for 35 mudstone samples and four clastic rock samples from the Paleogene Dainan Formation near the Gaoyou Depression in the northern Jiangsu Basin, with the aims to investigate the source of the Dainan Formation and the evolution of the basement structure of northern Jiangsu Basin and finally to restore the coupling relation between sedimentary basin and source area. Whole rock geochemical results display that the sediments in the study area was derived mainly from the Late Proterozoic low- grade metamorphic rocks in the Dabie- Sulu orogenic belt, probably the I- type high potassium granite gneiss. Cathodoluminescence (CL) images of detrital zircons reveal the most magma crystallized zircons and few overgrowth mixing zircons selected from the samples, indicating multiple- episode magma tectonic events in the study area. Zircon U- Pb ages show that there are four episodes of detrital zircons in the North Jiangsu Basin: ①Late Paleozoic- Mesozoic (100~300 Ma): igneous rocks from the Southern Zhangbaling uplift (100~200 Ma), unmetamorphic rocks in the DabieSulu orogenic belt (200 ~ 250 Ma), and the first phase of felsic magmatism of the Emeishan Large Igneous Province in the western margin of Yangtze platform (250~300 Ma); ②Late Proterozoic (700~850 Ma): the Late Proterozoic low- grade metamorphic granite widely distributed in the Dabie- Sulu orogenic belt; ③Early Proterozoic (1700~1900 Ma): respond to the tectonic events in the cracking of the Yangtze platform and supercontinent; ④Late Archean- Early Proterozoic (2450~2600 Ma): crystalline basement of the Yangtze platform. The minimum age of 94±2 Ma obtained in this study is earlier than the time of the Yizheng Movement, suggesting that the sediments of the Dainan Formation in the southern slope of the southern Gaoyou depression mainly consists mainly of the recycled sediments, which originated mainly from the crystalline basement of the Yangtze platform and the shallow metamorphic basement of the Dabie- Sulu orogen, further affected by the Mesozoic igneous rocks in the southern part of the Zhangbaling uplift.