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Pollen Diagrams (pollen + diagram)
Selected AbstractsLong-term succession in a Danish temperate deciduous forestECOGRAPHY, Issue 2 2005Richard H. W. Bradshaw Forest successional trajectories covering the last 2000 yr from a mixed deciduous forest in Denmark show a gradual shift in dominance from Tilia cordata to Fagus sylvatica and a recent increase in total forest basal area since direct management ceased in 1948. The successions are reconstructed by combining a fifty-year record of direct tree observations with local pollen diagrams from Draved Forest, Denmark. Five of the seven successions record a heathland phase of Viking Age dating from 830 AD. The anthropogenic influence is considerable throughout the period of study even though Draved contains some of the most pristine forest stands in Denmark. Anthropogenic influence including felling masks the underlying natural dynamics, with the least disturbed sites showing the smallest compositional change. Some effects of former management, such as loss of Tilia cordata dominance, are irreversible. Artificial disturbance, particularly drainage, has accelerated and amplified the shift towards Fagus dominance that would have occurred on a smaller scale and at a slower rate in the absence of human intervention. [source] Abandonment of farmland and vegetation succession following the Eurasian plague pandemic of ad 1347,52JOURNAL OF BIOGEOGRAPHY, Issue 4 2007Dan Yeloff Abstract Aim, This paper reviews the available documentary, archaeological and palaeoecological evidence for the abandonment of agricultural land and consequent regeneration of the forest in Europe after the Black Death. Location, Western and northern Europe. Methods, This review is the result of an exhaustive search of the historical, archaeological and palaeoecological literature for evidence indicating agricultural decline and forest regeneration in Eurasia during the 14th century. The available evidence for landscape change can be divided into two categories: (1) documentary and archaeological sources, and (2) palaeoecological reconstructions of past vegetation. In the past few years, several pollen diagrams from north-west Europe have been reported with precise chronologies (decadal and even annual scale) showing the abandonment of farmland and consequent ecological change in the late medieval period. Results and main conclusions, There is strong evidence of agricultural continuity at several sites in Western Europe at the time of the Black Death. The effects of the Black Death on the European rural landscape varied geographically, with major factors probably including the impact of the plague on the local population, and soil quality. At two sites in western and northern Ireland, the late medieval decline in cereal agriculture was probably a direct result of population reduction following the Black Death. In contrast, the decline in cereal production began at sites in Britain and France before the Black Death pandemic of ad 1347,52, and was probably due to the crisis in the agricultural economy, exacerbated by political instability and climate deterioration. Much of the abandoned arable land was probably exploited for grazing during the period between the decline in cereal farming and the Black Death. In the aftermath of the Black Death, grazing pressure was greatly reduced owing to reductions in the grazing animal population and a shortage of farmers. Vegetation succession on the abandoned grazing land resulted in increased cover of woody tree species, particularly Betula and Corylus, by the late 14th century. The cover of woodland was greatest at c.ad 1400, before forest clearance and agriculture increased in intensity. [source] Bacterial ancient DNA as an indicator of human presence in the past: its correlation with palynological and archaeological data,JOURNAL OF QUATERNARY SCIENCE, Issue 4 2009Jacek Madeja Abstract Palynological investigation is one of the most important tools for reconstructing past vegetation. Some plants have proved to be relatively sensitive indicators of human activity, but most of them are not specific. In this paper we propose a method which can be used for the verification of phases of anthropogenic impact on vegetation distinguished in pollen diagrams. In this work we adopted the existing molecular methods for tracking bacterial ancient DNA of Bifidobacterium and Bacteroides-Prevotella (known as human- and cow-specific genetic markers) in palynologically and archaeologically associated sediments. This method can be helpful in determining local human presence, especially in those time periods when pollen analysis has not always been very discriminating (Palaeolithic, Mesolithic) and at sites without archaeological evidence. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source] CONTRASTING SUBSISTENCE STRATEGIES IN THE EARLY IRON AGE?OXFORD JOURNAL OF ARCHAEOLOGY, Issue 2 2009AND THE THRACIAN PLAIN, BULGARIA, HUNGARY, NEW RESULTS FROM THE ALFÖLD PLAIN Summary. What can students of the past do to establish the predominant land-use and settlement practices of populations who leave little or no artefactual discard as a testament to their lifeways? The traditional answer, especially in Eastern Europe, is to invoke often exogenous nomadic pastoralists whose dwelling in perpetuo mobile was based on yurts, minimal local ceramic production and high curation levels of wooden and metal containers. Such a lacuna of understanding settlement structure and environmental impacts typifies Early Iron Age (henceforth ,EIA') settlements in both Bulgaria and eastern Hungary , a period when the inception of the use of iron in Central and South-East Europe has a profound effect on the flourishing regional bronze industries of the Late Bronze Age (henceforth ,LBA'). The methodological proposal in this paper is the high value of palynological research for subsistence strategies and human impacts in any area with a poor settlement record. This proposal is illustrated by two new lowland pollen diagrams , Ezero, south-east Bulgaria, and Sarló-hát, north-east Hungary , which provide new insights into this research question. In the Thracian valley, there is a disjunction between an area of high arable potential, the small size and short-lived nature of most LBA and EIA settlements and the strong human impact from the LBA and EIA periods in the Ezero diagram. In the Hungarian Plain, the pollen record suggests that, during the LBA,EIA, extensive grazing meadows were established in the alluvial plain, with the inception of woodland clearance on a massive scale from c.800 cal BC, that contradicts the apparent decline in human population in this area. An attempted explanation of these results comprises the exploration of three general positions , the indigenist thesis, the exogenous thesis and the interactionist thesis. Neither of these results fits well with the traditional view of EIA populations as incoming steppe nomadic pastoralists. Instead, this study seeks to explore the tensions between local productivity and the wider exchange networks in which they are entangled. [source] | ||||||||||