New Holocene tephras and a proxy climate record from a blanket mire in northern Skye, Scotland

Abstract

AbstractFour Holocene tephras of Icelandic origin have been identified and geochemically characterised from a water shedding blanket peat sequence on the Trotternish ridge, Isle of Skye, Scotland. Geochemical characterisation of the shards propose the Glen Garry tephra to be present, a tephra layer of Hekla origin incorporating shards from Hekla‐4, as well as two new tephras dated by interpolation from a radiocarbon based chronology to ca. 830 cal. yr BP and ca. 2340 cal. yr BP. The new historic tephra has an ambiguous geochemistry and therefore has not been correlated with other known Icelandic historic tephras. The new prehistoric tephra is suggested as originating from the Snæfellsjökull volcano in northwest Iceland and forms an important stratigraphical marker in this Holocene sequence. A proxy climate record has been derived from humification analyses of the peat, which compares well with other regional palaeoclimatic reconstructions, as well as enabling correlations based on tephra geochemical linkages between sites and climatic records at precise times in the past. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.