Francisco J. Jiménez-Espejo

Spanish National Research Council | CSIC · Instituto Andaluz de Ciencias de la Tierra (IACT)

Westernmost Europe constitutes a key location in determining the timing of the replacement of Neanderthals by anatomically modern humans (AMHs). In this study, the replacement of late Mousterian industries by Aurignacian ones at the site of Bajondillo Cave (Málaga, southern Spain) is reported. On the basis of Bayesian analyses, a total of 26 radioc...

The late Miocene‐early Pliocene (7.4‐4.5 Ma) is a key interval in Earth's history where intense reorganization of atmospheric and ocean circulation occurred within a global cooling scenario. The Southern African monsoon (SAFM) potentially played an important role in climate systems variability during this interval. However, the dynamics of this imp...

The Muslim expansion in the Mediterranean basin was one the most relevant and rapid cultural changes in human history. This expansion reached the Iberian Peninsula with the replacement of the Visigothic Kingdom by the Muslim Umayyad Caliphate and the Muslim Emirate of Córdoba during the 8th century CE. In this study we made a compilation of western...

One of the prehistoric techniques of salt production consisted of using ceramic vessels, known as briquetage, for the artificial evaporation of salt water. This paper summarizes all the archaeological sites throughout the Iberinan Peninsula where briquetage has been described to date, with special focus on the well-studied archaeological site of Es...

The Pliocene epoch emerges as a pivotal juncture in Earth's climatic evolution, characterized by pronounced warmth and elevated atmospheric carbon dioxide compared to contemporary levels. While the broader climatic context of the Pliocene has garnered attention, there remains an outstanding gap in detailed paleoclimate reconstructions of the early...

Ecuador is a key area in South America when it comes to understanding the economic, social and archaeological aspects of pre-Hispanic cultures in the northwestern region of the Andes. Among the most complex societies to have inhabited this territory is the so-called Manteño culture (AD ∼800–1530), which spanned across most of Ecuador’s central Paci...

The regions near the Antarctic Peninsula in the Southern Ocean are highly productive, with notable phytoplanktonic blooms in the ice-free season. The primary productivity is sustained by the supply of nutrients from convective mixing with nitrate-rich subsurface waters, which promotes rapid phytoplankton growth as the sea ice melts in spring and su...

This study examines the Holocene history of Río Seco Lake (3040 m a.s.l; Sierra Nevada, Southern Spain) by analysing diatom remains and other paleoenvironmental data. The aim is to understand the impact of long-term environmental and climatic variability on the aquatic ecosystem over the past 21,000 years. Our results suggest that shifts in diatom...

Here we present multiproxy evidence of a new type of Neanderthal hearth discovered in Vanguard Cave (VC) (Gibraltar), which is dated ∼ 65 kyr, and associated with Middle Paleolithic stone artefacts. The hearth structure coincides with predictions from theoretical studies which require the use of heating structures for obtaining birch tar, commonly...

Between the advanced Neolithic and Chalcolithic periods, a network of circulation of raw materials and exotic and prestige objects consisting of ivories, amber, large flint blades, exotic minerals and ostrich eggshells first emerged, then consolidated and later intensified in the western Mediterranean and the Iberian Peninsula.

Megaliths represent the earliest form of monumental stone architecture. The earliest megalithic chambers in Europe appeared in France in the fifth millennium BCE. Menga is the oldest of the great dolmens in Iberia (approximately 3800 to 3600 BCE). Menga’s capstone #5 weighing 150 tons is the largest stone ever moved in Iberia as part of the megalit...

The Maldives Archipelago (Indian Ocean), composed of two rows of atolls that enclose an inner sea, offers an excellent study site to explore the forcings of carbonate production at platforms. Glacial–interglacial sea-level changes have been claimed to be the main factor controlling the carbonate platform factories; however, climatic factors may als...

Meat consumption by early hominins is a hotly debated issue. A key question concerns their access to large mammal carcasses, including megafauna. Currently, the evidence of anthropic cut marks on proboscidean bones older than -or close to- 1.0 Ma are restricted to the archaeological sites of Dmanisi (Georgia), Olduvai (Tanzania), Gona (Ethiopia), O...

The technical and intellectual capabilities of past societies are reflected in the monuments they were able to build. Tracking the provenance of the stones utilised to build prehistoric megalithic monuments, through geological studies, is of utmost interest for interpreting ancient architectures as well as to contribute to their protection. Accordi...

During the Roman domain of the Iberian Peninsula (from 201 BCE to 460 CE) water management infrastructures were built to satisfy high water demand. However, whether the Roman activities affected the hydrological balance of Iberian wetlands remains unclear. Here, we investigate the paleo-hydrology of Lake Zóñar (southern Iberia) by using the stable...

Recent studies highlight the role of the Mediterranean Outflow Water (MOW), in the intensification of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation and as source of heat and salty water to high latitudes. During the Late Miocene the MOW suffered major changes and likely a total collapse during the Messinian Salinity Crisis (MSC). In order to stud...

En este artículo hemos evaluado si el espacio físico propuesto para la batalla de los montes Transductinos por Soto el al., en este mismo volumen, se ajusta a las descripciones de las fuentes primarias. Factores como el número de tropas y el paisaje, entre otros, han sido desarrollados en este estudio. Los nuevos datos nos han permitido plantear un...

La precisa ubicación geográfica de la batalla que dio inicio a la conquista musulmana del Reino visigodo ha sido una de las cuestiones más debatidas por la historiografía española. Estudios anteriores casi siempre optaron por un enfoque filológico. En este trabajo, sin dejar de lado cuestiones filológicas, hemos primado los testimonios geográficos,...

documented since the Middle Palaeolithic, mainly in the western Mediterranean and southern Africa. In southern Iberia, the mollusc assemblages associated with archaeological sites show a continuous record regardless of palaeoclimatic conditions. Among these, limpets are uninterruptedly abundant from the Middle Palaeolithic to the Bronze age with th...

Changes in sea-level are linked to glacial-interglacial variability and have been claimed as the main factor controlling the production of carbonate platform factories. The Maldives archipelago (Indian Ocean), composed of two rows of atolls that enclose an inner sea, is a very sensitive region to sea-level changes. The sediments of the Inner Sea, o...

Speleothems are a valuable source of paleo-records due to their inorganic elementcontent and profile. The elemental variations in speleothems can be a supplementaryinput to interpret the related climate proxies. Element ratios such as Ba/Ca and Mg/Caare often used as indicators of climate conditions over time. This study presents arecord of 12 sele...

Antequera in southern Spain is widely recognised as an outstanding example of the European megalithic phenomenon. One of its most remarkable features is the evident relationship between conspicuous natural formations and human-built monuments. Here, the authors report the results of their investigation of a tomb newly discovered at the site of Pied...

COORDINACIÓN José S. Carrión EQUIPO EDITORIAL José S. Carrión, Juan Ochando, Manuel Munuera, Manuel Casas-Gallego, Gabriela Amorós Secretaria Técnica y Maquetación Maximiliano Gómez Rodríguez, Santiago Fernández, Manuel Munuera Trabajo artístico Gabriela Amorós, Victoria Sánchez-Giner, Ariadna Amorós, Manuel Munuera, Manuel Fernández-Díaz, Pedro...

The Padul-15-05 sediment core provides an exceptional perspective of the paleoenvironmental and climate change in the Western Mediterranean region for the last ca. 200 kyr. However, even though a robust chronology mainly relying on radiometric dating is available for the last 50 ka, the chronology for the older sediments is not yet fully resolved....

Resumen El análisis mineralógico e isotópico de los precipitados carbonatados actuales, y de las aguas de infiltración, junto con los datos de monitorización y seguimiento instrumental durante los últimos cinco años en la Cueva de Nerja, permiten realizar una evaluación sobre el funcionamiento espeleotémico actual. Este seguimiento revela variacion...

Tierra del Fuego in Argentina is a unique location to examine past Holocene wind variability since it intersects the core of the Southern HemisphereWesterlyWinds (SHWW). TheSHWWare the most powerful prevailing winds on Earth. Their variation plays a role in regulating atmospheric CO2 levels and rainfall amounts and distribution, both today and in t...

The Guadix-Baza Basin (GBB, Granada, Spain) extends over a surface area of some 4.500 km2 and constitutes one of the richest Pleistocene vertebrate fossil records in Western Europe. Within this basin, Orce area stands out for having yielded evidence on of the oldest hominin presence in western Eurasia. Exceptionally rich collections of stone tools...

Evaporitic lakes such as playa-lakes are characteristic of many arid regions and are unique environments with respect to fauna and flora, while being very vulnerable to climate and environmental fluctuations and threatened by the current global change scenario. Water balance oscillations in these systems can trigger the precipitation or dissolution...

The North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) has a major effect on the modern precipitation patterns in the southern Iberian Peninsula and also controlled the hydroclimate of this region in the past [1,2]. The oxygen and hydrogen stable isotopes (δ 18 O and δD) of lake waters are sensitive to long-term changes in hydrological conditions (e.g. relative humi...

Understanding the effects ofClimateclimate changeClimate change and human activities on fragile mountain ecosystems is necessary to successfully managing these environments under future climateClimate scenarios (e.g., global warming, enhanced aridity). This can be done through the study of paleoecological records, which can provide long paleoenviro...

Prior to ~1 million years ago (Ma), variations in global ice volume were dominated by changes in obliquity; however, the role of precession remains unresolved. Using a record of North Atlantic ice rafting spanning the past 1.7 million years, we find that the onset of ice rafting within a given glacial cycle (reflecting ice sheet expansion) consiste...

During the Last Glacial Maximum and deglaciation, the Iberian Peninsula served as a faunal and human population refugium. Human foodways have always played a pivotal role in understanding social and cultural practices in prehistory. Nonetheless, the limited number of archaeological sites and human remains in this region hinders the complete underst...

The Adélie Basin is a relatively small (∼1600 km²), semi-enclosed continental shelf bathymetric depression located adjacent to the Wilkes Subglacial Basin, a basin underlying a sector of the East Antarctic Ice Sheet that contains ∼3–4 meters sea level equivalent of ice. Located within the Adélie Basin is a ∼184 m thick laminated sediment deposit, t...

The West Antarctic Ice Sheet (WAIS) presently holds enough ice to raise global sea level by 4.3 m if completely melted. The unknown response of the WAIS to future warming remains a significant challenge for numerical models in quantifying predictions of future sea level rise. Sea level rise is one of the clearest planet-wide signals of human-induce...

Changing redox conditions in water columns or sediment–water interfaces of lakes are captured as sedimentary archives, and are often influenced by climate. Their study therefore permits the reconstruction of past climate change on (sub‐) annual to longer timescales. In Lago Fagnano (54°S Argentina/Chile), a large oligotrophic and deep‐oxygenated la...

Integration of foraminiferal and geochemical data (stable isotope and elemental composition) from West Alboran Basin (WAB) ODP Site 976 allowed evaluation of the effects of the initial Mediterranean – Atlantic restriction event preceding the Messinian Salinity Crisis (MSC) in a context of late Miocene cooling and diminishing water – mass exchange c...

The Indian summer monsoon (ISM) is critical to billions of people living in the region. In this study, high-resolution major element composition and Globigerinoides ruber sensu stricto (G. ruber s.s.) δ¹⁸O measurements of a sediment core collected from the western Bay of Bengal indicated a high sensitivity of the study site to monsoonal climate var...

We present a high-resolution analysis of seven marine sediment records from the western Mediterranean in a transect from the Algero-Balearic basin to the Alboran Sea, spanning the last 20 ka, to decipher the paleoenvironmental and paleoceanographic evolution of the Western Mediterranean Sea. To do so, diverse elemental ratios have been used for rec...

Antarctic sea-ice extent, primary productivity and ocean circulation represent interconnected systems that form important components of the global carbon cycle. Subdecadal to centennial-scale variability can influence the characteristics and interactions of these systems, but observational records are too short to evaluate the impacts of this varia...

Several organic and inorganic geochemical analyses have been carried out in the sedimentary record of the Borreguil de los Lavaderos de la Reina (BdlR-03), an alpine peat bog located on the north face of the Sierra Nevada (southern Iberian Peninsula). This study permitted a high-resolution reconstruction of paleoenvironmental evolution for the last...

Though the Strait of Gibraltar today is the only seaway that connects the Mediterranean Sea with the global ocean, in the late Miocene the Mediterranean-Atlantic gateway was composed of multiple connections through the Betic and Rifian corridors. Due to the position of the Gibraltar Arc in region of convergence of the African European plates, the a...

In the southern Indian Ocean, the position of the subtropical front-the boundary between colder, fresher waters to the south and warmer, saltier waters to the north-has a strong influence on the upper ocean hydrodynamics and biogeochemistry. Here we analyse a sedimentary record from the Agulhas Plateau, located close to the modern position of the s...

Mangroves are key ecosystems which respond to global changes in tropical and subtropical regions worldwide. We describe late Holocene mangroves that established close to the southernmost limit (28°S) for this type of ecosystem in South America. Our findings are based on a ¹⁴C dated core obtained from Babitonga Bay, Santa Catarina State, Brazil (26°...

The transitional regions between the low and high latitudes of the Northern Hemisphere are highly vulnerable to future climate change yet most of the current climate models usually diverge in their projections. To better understand the dynamics in these regions, the reconstruction of past hydrological fluctuations and precipitation patterns is of p...

The Doñana area in southern Iberia is one of the most renowned protected areas of Europe, mostly due to the diversity and value of its wetland ecosystems. The large biogeographical significance of this territory and the outstanding availability of sedimentary archives have made this region a hotspot of paleobotanical research in the Iberian Peninsu...

The Last Glacial Termination is marked by changing environmental conditions affected by abrupt and rapid climate oscillations, such as Heinrich Stadial 1 (HS1), which is characterized by extremely low sea surface temperatures (SST) and significant changes in northern hemisphere terrestrial landscape (e.g., vegetation) and human dispersion. Previous...

La Crisi di Salinità del Messiniano ha interessato il Mar Mediterraneo tra 5.97 e 5.33 Ma ed ha portato alla deposizione di enormi accumuli di depositi evaporitici sia nei bacini marginali che in quelli profondi. Anche se tuttora largamente dibattuto, questo evento paleo-ambientale estremo è stato probabilmente causato dalla riduzione o addirittura...

Late Miocene sedimentary records in the Gibraltar arch region hold fundamental information on the Atlantic-Mediterranean connectivity before, during and after the Messinian Salinity Crisis (MSC; 5.96-5.33 Ma). In this work we tackle this still unresolved problem through a detailed foraminifer-based biostratigraphy, micro- paleontological and geoche...

Late Miocene sedimentary records in the Gibraltar arch region hold fundamental information on the Atlantic-Mediterranean connectivity before, during and after the Messinian Salinity Crisis (MSC; 5.96-5.33 Ma). In this work we tackle this still unresolved problem through a detailed foraminifer-based biostratigraphy, micropaleontological and geochemi...

The dominant feature of large-scale mass transfer in the modern ocean is the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation (AMOC). The geometry and vigour of this circulation influences global climate on various timescales. Palaeoceanographic evidence suggests that during glacial periods of the past 1.5 million years the AMOC had markedly different f...

Over recent decades Antarctic sea-ice extent has increased, alongside widespread ice shelf thinning and freshening of waters along the Antarctic margin. In contrast, Earth system models generally simulate a decrease in sea ice. Circulation of water masses beneath large-cavity ice shelves is not included in current Earth System models and may be a d...

This paper constitutes the first comprehensive review of animal fossils retrieved in Iberian archaeological sites. Out of 633 items from 82 sites, 143 were analyzed and a further 13 assessed and their status clarified by us on 20 sites. Among others, this study is the first one in Iberia to assess the role played by fossil scaphopods and to carry o...

Despite numerous efforts to properly differentiate between contourites and other deep-water deposits in cores and outcrops, reliable diagnostic criteria are still lacking. The co-occurrence of downslope and along-slope sedimen-tary processes makes it particularly difficult to differentiate these relatively homogeneous deposits. The main aim of this...

To investigate past changes in the Mediterranean Overflow Water (MOW) to the Atlantic, we analyzed the strength of the MOW and benthic δ¹³C along the last 250 kyr at Integrated Ocean Drilling Program (IODP) Site U1389 in the Gulf of Cadiz, near the Strait of Gibraltar. Both the strength of the MOW and the benthic δ¹³C were mainly driven by precessi...

Abstract. Over recent decades Antarctic sea-ice extent has increased, alongside widespread ice shelf thinning and freshening of waters along the Antarctic margin. In contrast, Earth system models generally simulate a decrease in sea ice. Circulation of water masses beneath large cavity ice shelves is not included in current models and may be a driv...