Pollen stratigraphical synthesis from Valle di Castiglione (Roma)

doi:10.1016/1040-6182(89)90076-1

Quaternary International

Volumes 3–4, 1989, Pages 81-84

https://doi.org/10.1016/1040-6182(89)90076-1 Get rights and content

Abstract

A long bore-hole drilled in the ancient maar-lake sediments of Valle di Castiglione has enabled the history of the vegetation and climate of the region for the last 250,000 years to be reconstructed. The forest pollen zones are different from each other by the presence of species which are today extinct in Italy, and by the diversity of the dominant vegetational configurations.

Before the Eemian, the pollen record from Valle di Castiglione can be compared with very few other European records. After the Eemian, the biostratigraphy corresponds by and large with what is known about southern and western Europe, but at the same time it has peculiar floristic and vegetational features, which may be due to the particular geographical position of Valle di Castiglione.

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M. Alessio et al.
¹⁴C dating, geochemical features, faunistic and pollen analyses of the uppermost 10 m core from Valle di Castiglione (Rome, Italy)
Geologica romana
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M. Follieri et al.
Late Pleistocene Zelkova extinction in Central Italy
New Phytologist
(1986)
M. Follieri et al.
250,000-year pollen record from Valle di Castiglione (Roma)
Pollen et Spores
(1988)

There are more references available in the full text version of this article.

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After eight decades since its discovery in 1939, new investigations have been undertaken at Grotta Guattari (Latium, central Italy), a coastal cave by the Tyrrhenian Sea coast and one of the iconic sites of the Italian prehistory, as it yielded an almost complete skull and other remains of Neanderthals. The new excavations of the innermost and untouched cave deposits resulted in an outstanding amount of mammal bones, 40 out of which attributable to Neanderthal, including new large portions of cranial remains. Preliminary taphonomic hints and the collected stratigraphic evidence strongly indicate that the impressive accumulation of the large mammal bones was the work of spotted hyena, in a period in which human frequentation was really sporadic or even completely absent. The new acquired U/Th chronology of Grotta Guattari speleothems provided new constraints for reconstructing the sedimentary and paleoenvironmental history of the archaeological successions and human remains. The accumulation of terrestrial sediments started at ∼112 ka, immediately after the end of the Last Interglacial sea-level highstand (∼116 ka). However, the hyena frequentation, and thus the bone accumulations, occurred several thousands of years after and lasted for a very short time interval, precisely between slightly before 66 ka and 65 ka. The cave became abandoned by hyena after ∼65 ka and before ∼59 ka, because of the cave obstruction and/or the altered environmental conditions related to the Heinrich Event 6 (∼64–60 ka). The regional paleoclimatic records indicate severe conditions during the short interval of the hyena frequentation. In contrast, though providing evidence of open and arid environments, the faunal assemblage and the pollen from Grotta Guattari reveal that the local conditions were less severe, likely because of the mitigating effect of the Tyrrhenian Sea. In the framework of the Italian findings, Grotta Guattari results the richest and better chronologically constrained site of Neanderthal remains, posing it as one of the rare sites of the European prehistory that allows putting into the context an extraordinary large sample of the population of Neanderthals, and of other large mammals, in a very narrow and precisely dated temporal interval of the early Pleniglacial.
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There are no Saalian Stage pollen records in Northwest Europe that not only cover an entire interglacial complex but also have been successfully correlated down to marine isotope substage level. The presented pollen record fills this knowledge gap. Three pollen sequences, sampled from a well-preserved Saalian Stage river terrace near Brussels (Belgium), together span most of an interglacial complex: two interglacial cycles and one interstadial separated by colder intervals. To date the pollen data, the authors present a multi-proxy supported river evolution model through which the correlation of the pollen record with the penultimate interglacial complex (Marine Isotope Stage (MIS) 7) becomes apparent. The authors further illustrate homotaxis—defined as the similarity between pollen diagrams that are not necessarily contemporaneous—by comparing MIS 7 with MIS 5 pollen data from the same area, convincingly curve-match the pollen record with marine isotope data, and point to similarities between Southern and Northwest European vegetation dynamics and climate variability during MIS 7.
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Palaeoecological evidence of intra-Saalian warm stages in Central Europe, which was strongly affected by glacial and periglacial processes during the major Middle and Late Pleistocene cold periods, is ambiguous so far. Recently, the first continuous sedimentary sequence of Central Europe containing the Saalian complex (MIS 8–6) with the Eemian interglacial in stratigraphic superposition was recovered from the newly discovered Neualbenreuth Maar (NE-Bavaria). Here we present palynological results from this record allowing us to critically discuss the available biostratigraphical evidence of alternating intra-Saalian warm-cold intervals from Central Europe. The new pollen record from the Neualbenreuth Maar comprises a continuous record of vegetation and climate changes encompassing four warm stages and five cold periods. The dominance of cold and dry tolerant herbs and the sparse representation of pioneer trees and shrubs during most parts of the sequence indicate open landscapes of steppe to woody-steppe character typical of late Middle and Late Pleistocene glacial periods in Central Europe. The pollen assemblages of the warm stage in the upper part of the core clearly support its correlation with the Eemian interglacial. The three pre-Eemian warm stages represent terrestrial analogues of the marine isotope stages (MIS) 7e, 7c, and 7a. During each of these intervals forests were established, but the reduced abundances and lower diversity of thermophilous and sub-oceanic elements in comparison to the Eemian attest to a weak interglacial character. Each of these interglacials shows a similar vegetation succession and only minor differences in the vegetation composition. The intervening stadial periods represent a strong (MIS 7d) and a moderate (MIS 7b) climate deterioration, respectively. The vegetation and climate succession during the Saalian glacial-interglacial complex of Neualbenreuth is broadly in line with the respective palynological signature from the Velay record (French Massif Central) and the Hoogeveen interstadial (The Netherlands). In contrast, there is only limited correspondence with most pollen records from northern and southern Central Europe, which were hitherto classified as MIS 7.

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Abstract

References (6)

¹⁴C dating, geochemical features, faunistic and pollen analyses of the uppermost 10 m core from Valle di Castiglione (Rome, Italy)

Geologica romana

Late Pleistocene Zelkova extinction in Central Italy

New Phytologist

250,000-year pollen record from Valle di Castiglione (Roma)

Pollen et Spores

Cited by (82)

Setting the basis for a high-resolution record of the late Quaternary to present climate variability from Castiglione maar, central Italy: First results from AMUSED project

Neanderthal bones collected by hyena at Grotta Guattari, central Italy, 66–65 ka: U/Th chronology and paleoenvironmental setting

Penultimate interglacial palynology of Flanders: A revised river evolution model

The faunal assemblage from La Sassa cave (Latium, Italy): Environmental perspective of a Late Pleistocene cave hyena – Brown bear den

Dermestid pupal chambers on Late Pleistocene faunal bones from Cava Muracci (Cisterna di Latina, central Italy): Environmental implications for the central Mediterranean basin during MIS 3

A contribution towards the palynostratigraphical classification of the Middle Pleistocene in Central Europe: The pollen record of the Neualbenreuth Maar, northeastern Bavaria (Germany)

Pollen stratigraphical synthesis from Valle di Castiglione (Roma)

Abstract

14C dating, geochemical features, faunistic and pollen analyses of the uppermost 10 m core from Valle di Castiglione (Rome, Italy)

Geologica romana

Late Pleistocene Zelkova extinction in Central Italy

New Phytologist

250,000-year pollen record from Valle di Castiglione (Roma)

Pollen et Spores

¹⁴C dating, geochemical features, faunistic and pollen analyses of the uppermost 10 m core from Valle di Castiglione (Rome, Italy)