Late Holocene drought responsible for the collapse of Old World civilizations is recorded in an Italian cave flowstone
A severe drought in parts of low-latitude northeastern Africa and southwestern Asia ∼4200 yr ago caused major disruption to ancient civilizations. Stable isotope, trace element, and organic fluorescence data from a calcite flowstone collected from the well-watered Alpi Apuane karst of central-wester...
| Published in: | Geology |
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| Main Authors: | , , , |
| Format: | Text |
| Language: | unknown |
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Digital Commons @ University of South Florida
2006
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://digitalcommons.usf.edu/kip_articles/7614 https://doi.org/10.1130/G22103.1 |
| Summary: | A severe drought in parts of low-latitude northeastern Africa and southwestern Asia ∼4200 yr ago caused major disruption to ancient civilizations. Stable isotope, trace element, and organic fluorescence data from a calcite flowstone collected from the well-watered Alpi Apuane karst of central-western Italy indicate that the climatic event responsible for this drought was also recorded in mid-latitude Europe. Although the timing of this event coincides with an episode of increased ice-rafted debris to the subpolar North Atlantic, the regional ocean-atmosphere response seems atypical of similar Holocene ice-rafting events. Furthermore, comparison of the flowstone data with other regional proxies suggests that the most extreme part of the dry spell occurred toward the end of a longer-term climate anomaly. |
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