Radiocarbon ages of soil charcoals from the southern Alps

• Main Authors: Ticino Switzerland, Irka Hajdas A, Nadia Schlumpf B, Nicole Minikus-stary B, Frank Hagedorn B, Eileen Eckmeier C, Werner Schoch B, Conradin Burga C, Georges Bonani D, Michael W. I. Schmidt C, Paolo Cherubini B
• Other Authors: The Pennsylvania State University CiteSeerX Archives
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Published: 2007
• Subjects: AMS 14C dating; Charcoal; Castanea sativa; Paleo fires; Misox Switzerland; Low Lake; North Atlantic
• Online Access: http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.495.3449; http://www.geo.uzh.ch/~mschmidt/downloads/hajdas2007_ticino.pdf

Radiocarbon dating of macroscopic charcoal is a useful tool for paleoclimatic and paleoecologic reconstructions. Here we present results of 14C dating of charcoals found in charcoal-rich soils of Ticino and the Misox Valley (southern Switzerland) which indicate that the Late Glacial and early Holocene fires coincided with warm phases in the North Atlantic region and low lake levels in the Central Europe. Late Holocene charcoals found in these soils document an earlier than believed presence of sweet chestnut (Castanea sativa Mill.) in southern Switzerland. Sweet chestnut trees play a key role in Mediterranean woodlands, and for longer than two millennia have been used as a food source. Based on palynological evidence it is commonly believed that in southern Switzerland C. sativa was first introduced 2000 years ago by the Romans, who cultivated it for wood and fruit production. Our results indicate that this tree species was present on the southern slopes of the Alps!1500 years earlier than previously assumed, and therefore was likely introduced inde-pendently from cultivation by the Romans.