Di Lorenzo, Halinka (2019) Human-environment interactions along the Tyrrhenian coasts of southern Italy from the Neolithic to the Early Medieval Age. A geoarchaeological approach. [Tesi di dottorato]

Preview

Text Tesi.pdf Download (19MB) | Preview

Collection description

Several environmental/climatic and cultural changes have affected central Mediterranean and particularly Italian peninsula during the Holocene. Therefore, the vegetation changes recorded in pollen sequences, especially in the late Holocene, can be partly linked to climate and environmental changes and partly to human impact. Distinguishing these drivers of ecosystem changes is still a challenge. In this work, the environmental changes that have occurred in the last 8000 years along the southern Tyrrhenian side of Italy have been analyzed using a multidisciplinary approach consisting in pollen analysis, paleoclimate reconstruction on pollen proxy and archeological analysis in well-defined chronological frameworks. In particular pollen analysis, considered the most appropriate method for reconstructing past landscapes, was carried out on five sediment cores collected along the Italian Tyrrhenian coast, in Campania and Calabria. Two marine cores were selected (Gulf of Salerno and the Gulf of Sant’Eufemia) in order to acquire a regional reference of vegetation changes, identified through pollen analysis, while three continental drilling cores (Sarno/San Vito sinkhole, Cellole/Mondragone, Lacco/Poro Plateau) have provided local vegetation reconstructions. The pollen data from the two marine cores were used for quantitative climate reconstructions (MAT). In both cores, the reconstructed climatic parameters show an aridification trend beginning in the late Holocene. This trend is also observed in pollen spectra, especially in the progressive decrease in Abies that tends to almost completely disappear in modern times. In addition, the climatic curves also show some cold/wet and cold/arid phases comparable with the global events also recognized in other Mediterranean sequences. Among the most important are the 8.2 ka BP event (Gulf of Salerno), the 4.2 ka BP event (mainly in Sant’Eufemia) and the 2.8 ka BP event (Gulfs of Salerno and Sant’Eufemia). Correlation between the new pollen results and published data have allowed us to better understand the phenomenon of vegetation change at a regional scale. All pollen data collected in the study area show a marked process of wide human deforestation since the Late Ancient Period (3rd cent. AD), while the local resource exploitation seems to occur in different modalities and time around the analyzed continental sites. Moreover, pollen data collected on the coastal plains sees a progressive disappearance of the floodplain forest since the Roman period. 2 Concerning human land use, fires and cereal crops appear since the Neolithic period, while the first Vitis domestication is dated to the Bronze Age. Other tree crops (Olea, Juglans, Castanea) seem well defined only since the Greek-Roman period, even if the start of these crops did not occur in all territories at the same time.

Downloads

Actions (login required)

View Item