From Pleniglacial to Holocene: a 14C chronostratigraphy of environmental changes in the Konya Plain, Turkey

Abstract

In the endoreic, semi-arid Konya basin on the central Anatolian plateaux, long-term hydrological evolution has left various landforms and lacustrine deposits reflecting the regional climatic evolution, as well as human influence on the local environments. This paper presents results from a cooperative programme grouping several institutes from Turkey and France, on lacustrine, marshy and aeolian sediment sequences of Upper Pleistocene and Holocene age. The detailed study of environmental evolution is based on the reconstruction as well as on the characterization of the extension and contraction phases of wetlands occupying the lowest parts of the Konya plain. A soil and a marsh layer are 14C dated ca. 28,000–25,000 yr bp. Three phases of Pleniglacial (from ca. 22,000 to 17,000 yr bp) high lake levels are distinguished. Complementary OSL dates on aeolian dunes confirm the occurrence of two drought periods: the first occurs around the start of the Late Glacial, the second after the Mid-Holocene climatic optimum, the latter being ‘in phase’ with a similar drought in other Eastern Mediterranean regions. After 17,000 yr bp, no lacustrine phase reached as high a level as the Pleniglacial lake. During the Late Glacial, a shallow freshwater lacustrine phase is identified from >12,500 to 11,000 yr bp. The Late Glacial to Holocene transition corresponds to a general absence of deposits and dateable material, thus suggesting a period of drought, to which no aeolian features have so far been related. The Holocene environmental evolution shows a period of marsh and shallow lake extansion from 6000 to 5500 yr bp; this wetter period is interrupted by the second drought (ca. 5500 yrs bp) as indicated by aeolian dune activity. During the Late Holocene, a renewal of marshes, as well as soil development on slopes, can be interpreted either as climatic changes or as impacts of human use of water and soil resources during prehistoric and historic times.