A pollen diagram from the northeast Peloponnese, Greece: implications for vegetation history and archaeology

Abstract

A pollen diagram is presented for a sediment core from Kleonai in southern Greece. A set of seven radiocarbon dates suggests that the core spans the time period from the beginning of the Holocene to the Roman period. Pollen preservation in the core is patchy and there are only three zones on the pollen diagram with countable quantities of pollen. These zones correspond with the early Neolithic, Bronze Age and Roman periods. The area around the site was largely open by the Neolithic but the wider landscape was still well wooded. In the Bronze Age and Roman periods, there is evidence for arable agriculture, including olive cultivation. By the Roman period, most of the semi-natural woodlands had disappeared and the landscape was probably not unlike that of the present day.