Warren John Eastwood

University of Birmingham · School of Geography, Earth and Environmental Sciences

Résumé Avec l’efflorescence des approches paléoscientifiques du passé, les historiens ont été confrontés à une multitude de nouveaux indices sur des phénomènes tant humains que naturels, des maladies aux migrations en passant par les transformations du paysage et le climat. Ces données inédites exigent une réécriture des récits portant sur les péri...

Quantitative reconstructions of past land cover are necessary to determine the processes involved in climate-human-land-cover interactions. We present the first temporally continuous and most spatially extensive pollen-based land-cover reconstruction for Europe over the Holocene (last 11 700 cal yr BP). We describe how vegetation cover has been qua...

Collapse is a term that has attracted much attention in social science literature in recent years, but there remain substantial areas of disagreement about how it should be understood in historical contexts. More specifically, the use of the term collapse often merely serves to dramatize long-past events, to push human actors into the background, a...

This third volume of the Kültepe International Meetings (KIM) series draws together multidisciplinary approaches to the archaeology and history of complex urban sites using Kültepe-Kanesh as a case study, with particular emphasis on Bronze Age material. The 3rd Kültepe International Meeting aimed at exploring multidisciplinary approaches to the ar...

Solar ultraviolet-B (UV-B) irradiance that reaches the Earth’s surface acts as a biotic stressor and has the potential to modify ecological and environmental functioning. The challenges of reconstructing ultraviolent (UV) irradiance prior to the satellite era mean that there is uncertainty over long-term surface UV-B patterns, especially in relatio...

Southern Anatolia is a highly significant area within the Mediterranean, particularly in terms of understanding how agriculture moved into Europe from neighbouring regions. This study uses pollen, palaeoclimate and archaeological evidence to investigate the relationships between demography and vegetation change, and to explore how the development o...

The Fertile Crescent, its hilly flanks and surrounding drylands has been a critical region for studying how climate has influenced societal change, and this review focuses on the region over the last 20,000 years. The complex social, economic, and environmental landscapes in the region today are not new phenomena and understanding their interaction...

Olive (Olea europaea L.) was one of the most important fruit trees in the ancient Mediterranean region and a founder species of horticulture in the Mediterranean Basin. Different views have been expressed regarding the geographical origins and timing of olive cultivation. Since genetic studies and macro-botanical remains point in different directio...

This study was carried out in the Teke Peninsula, in Cedrus libani A. Rich. (Lebanon cedar), Juniperus L. sp. (Juniper) and Quercus L. sp. (Oak) mixed forest (Susuz Dağ-Elmalı-Antalya), which is located in the Mediterranean mountain ecosystem. The purpose of the study is to determine the modern pollen distribution (influx and percentage) of this fo...

The debate in historical geomorphological studies about the causes of erosion in regions such as the Mediterranean has been long-standing. The relative roles of climate change and human impacts can be difficult to disentangle in the absence of highly resolved chronologies. Here we reconstruct the erosion history of a small lake catchment in central...

Establishing agricultural activity using pollen analysis is one of the prime challenges of a palaeoecological investigation. Here we report combined pollen and archaeobotanical data originating from a waterlogged off-site organic-rich fill radiocarbon dated to ∼8 ka Cal BP located between the two occupation mounds at Neolithic-Chalcolithic Çatalhöy...

Between the foundation of Constantinople as capital of the eastern half of the Roman Empire in 330 CE and its sack by the Fourth Crusade in 1204 CE, the Byzantine Empire underwent a full cycle from political-economic stability, through rural insecurity and agrarian decline, and back to renewed prosperity. These stages plausibly correspond to the ph...

This study carried out in Lake Tuzla in northeast Cappadocia (Central Anatolia- Kayseri-Palas Plain) aimed primarily to determine changes in paleovegetation of mid-to late-Holocene in the vicinity of Lake Tuzla and factors affecting these changes. A secondary objective was to determine paleoenvironmental conditions during the settlement period of K...

The Central Anatolian Region (CAR), being a high orogenic plateau (1000-1500 masl) is located between the Pontides in the north and the Taurides in the south, has a semi-arid climate. Significant changes occurred in vegetation and human activities within the CAR due to climate changes during the Holocene. On the other hand, the anthropogenic effect...

A positive shift in the oxygen isotope composition (δ18O) of lake carbonates in the Eastern Mediterranean from the early to late Holocene is usually interpreted as a change to drier (reduced P/E) conditions. However, it has also been suggested that changes in the seasonality of precipitation could explain these trends. Here, Holocene records of δ18...

Individual palaeoenvironmental records represent a combination of regional-scale (e.g. climatic) and site-specific local factors. Here we compare multiple climate proxies from two nearby maar lake records, assuming that common signals are due to regional-scale forcing. A new core sequence from Nar Lake in Turkey is dated by varves and U–Th to the l...

There is a lack of high-resolution records of hydroclimate variability in the Eastern Mediterranean from the late glacial and early Holocene. More knowledge of the speed of climate shifts and the degree to which they were synchronous with changes in the North Atlantic or elsewhere is required to understand better the controls on Eastern Mediterrane...

Large scale moisture flux analysis was carried out for the Mediterranean Basin in order to increase our understanding of the larger scale atmospheric controls on moisture flux convergence that are related to drier and wetter conditions. The seasonal moisture budget (precipitation minus evaporation) was calculated using the National Centers for Envi...

We have used sediments from Nar lake in central Turkey to reconstruct climatic variability over timescales longer than can be obtained from direct meteorological observations. Because the sediments of this lake are annually layered and precisely dated, it has been possible to calibrate sedimentary climate proxies against meteorological records to d...

Palaeo-hydrological interpretations of lake sediment proxies can benefit from a robust understanding of the modern lake environment. In this study, we use Nar Gölü, a non-outlet, monomictic maar lake in central Turkey, as a field site for a natural experiment using observations and measurements over a 17-year monitoring period (1997–2014). We compa...

The integration of high-resolution archaeological, textual, and environmental data with longer-term, low-resolution data affords greater precision in identifying some of the causal relationships underlying societal change. Regional and microregional case studies about the Byzantine world—in particular, Anatolia, which for several centuries was the...

Carbonates and diatoms are rarely deposited together in lake sediments in sufficient quantities for the oxygen isotope composition (δ18O) to be investigated simultaneously from both hosts. Here, δ18Ocarbonate are compared to δ18Odiatom data from the varved sediments of Nar Gölü, a closed lake in central Turkey, over the last 1710 years. Lake monito...

The eastern Mediterranean is a region whose vegetation and landscape has been modified by a range of natural and human-induced forcing mechanisms since the emergence of agriculture over 10,000 years ago. Therefore, the study of the role of vegetation within the landscape is crucial for understanding the longue-dureé of human-environment interaction...

Education in hydrology is changing rapidly due to diversification of students, emergent major scientific and practical challenges that our discipline must engage with, shifting pedagogic ideas and higher education environments, the need for students to develop new discipline specific and transferrable skills, and the advent of innovative technologi...

The northeast region of Turkey is characterised by relatively high annual precipitation totals and river flow. It is a mountainous region with high ecological status and also it is of prime interest to the energy sector. These characteristics make this region an important area for a hydroclimatology research in terms of future availability and mana...

Education in hydrology is changing rapidly due to diversification of students, emergent major scientific and practical challenges that our discipline must engage with, shifting pedagogic ideas and higher education environments, the need for students to develop new discipline specific and transferrable skills, and the advent of innovative technologi...

The eastern Mediterranean is a region whose vegetation and landscape has been modified by a range of natural and human-induced forcing mechanisms since the emergence of agriculture over 10,000 years ago. Therefore, the study of the role of vegetation within the landscape is crucial for understanding the longue-dureé of human-environment interaction...

A verified instrumental calibration of annually resolved 𝛅18O for a stalagmite from Gümü?hane in northeast Turkey is presented and cross validated using a ‘leave-one-out’ technique. The amount of late autumn to winter precipitation is negatively correlated with stalagmite 𝛅18O between AD 1938 and 2004. The observed relationship is extrapolated back...

A verified instrumental calibration of annually resolved δ18O for a stalagmite from Gümüşhane in northeast Turkey is presented and cross validated using a ‘leave-one-out’ technique. The amount of late autumn to winter precipitation is negatively correlated with stalagmite δ18O between AD 1938 and 2004. The observed relationship is extrapolated back...

A verified instrumental calibration of annually resolved δ18O for a stalagmite from Gümüşhane in northeast Turkey is presented and cross-validated using a ‘leave-one-out’ technique. The amount of late autumn to winter precipitation is negatively correlated with stalagmite δ18O between AD 1938 and 2004. The observed relationship is extrapolated back...

The identification and characterisation of high-frequency climatic changes during the Holocene requires natural archives with precise and accurate chronological control, which is usually difficult to achieve using only 14C chronologies. The presence of time-spaced tephra beds in Quaternary Mediterranean successions represents an additional, indepen...

The eastern Mediterranean region witnessed changes in human culture of the highest importance between ~9000 and ~2500 cal. BP (7000—500 BC) and over the same time period was affected by very significant shifts in climate. Stable isotope data from lake and deep-sea sediment cores and from cave speleothems show an overall trend from a wetter to a dri...

The identification and characterisation of high-frequency climatic changes during the Holocene requires natural archives with precise and accurate chronological control, which is usually difficult to achieve using only 14C chronologies. The presence of time-spaced tephra beds in Quaternary Mediterranean successions represents an additional, indepen...

Stalagmite records of oxygen (δ18O) isotopes, sampled at sub-annual resolution by micro-mill techniques are correlated with climate parameters over the instrumental period (1961 to 2005 AD). The strongest correlations were found between δ18O and total amount of late autumn–winter precipitation (October to January) smoothed by 6 yr, with marginally...

Detrital carbonate contamination is one of the principal problems with the integrity of stable isotope data from authigenic lake carbonates. Here we investigate the origin and climatic implications of stable isotope data from carbonate minerals deposited in two Mediterranean lakes: Gölhisar Gölü (SW Turkey) and Lake Pamvotis (NW Greece). In Gölhisa...

This study investigates changes in climate, vegetation, wildfire and human activity in Southwest Asia during the transition to Neolithic agriculture between ca. 16 and ca. 9ka. In order to trace the fire history of this region, we use microscopic charcoal from lake sediment sequences, and present two new records: one from south central Turkey (Akgo...

Turkish annual precipitation regimes are analysed to provide a large-scale perspective and redefine precipitation regions. Monthly total precipitation data are employed for 107 stations (1963–2002). Precipitation regime shape (seasonality) and magnitude (size) are classified using a novel multivariate methodology. Six shape and five magnitude class...

This paper explores the relationships between the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) index and precipitation and river flow over northeast Turkey. Precipitation totals and maximum, mean and minimum river flow are analysed at the seasonal scale for 12 and 10 stations, respectively. Pearson's and Mann-Kendall correlation tests are applied to assess rel...

Analysing precipitation variation patterns over Turkey is highly important to explain regional differences. Such analysis will greatly support Eastern Mediterranean climate change studies. In this study, spatial and temporal variability of annual precipitation over Turkey is analysed: (1) to redefine precipitation regime regions and (2) to evaluate...

Pollen analytical data reconstructed from annually-laminated lake sediments from Nar Gölü in Cappadocia (central Turkey) complemented by documentary and archaeological evidence provide a detailed record of environmental changes and their causes from late antiquity (AD 300) to the present day. Four principal land use phases can be discerned: (i) an...

Stalagmite records of oxygen (δ18O) isotopes, sampled at sub-annual resolution by micro-mill techniques are correlated with climate parameters over the instrumental period (1961 to 2005 AD). The strongest correlations were found between δ18O and total amount of late autumn-winter precipitation (October to January) smoothed by 6 years, with marginal...

Lake isotope records can be used to assess the spatial coherency of Late Quaternary climate change across the circum-Mediterranean region. We place modern and palaeo-data within a simple conceptual lake response model to show that the isotope hydrology of most Mediterranean lakes has been influenced strongly by water balance, even in those systems...

Coupled multiproxy indicators (pollen, stable isotopes and charcoal) reconstructed from annually laminated lake sediments from Nar Gölü in Cappadocia (central Turkey) complemented by documentary and archaeological evidence provide a detailed record of environmental changes and their causes from late Antiquity (AD 300) to the present day. Stable i...

Testate amoebae are unicellular micro-organisms whose hydrological sensitivity and good preservation in peats make them valuable proxies for past peatland surface wetness, and therefore climate. Previous testate amoebae transfer functions have been spatially restricted with no studies from Asia. To derive a transfer function, a sequence of samples...

Stable isotope and pollen data from Gölhisar Gölü, a small intramontane lake located in southwest Turkey, provide complementary records of Holocene climate change. Modern oxygen and hydrogen isotope water data are used as a means of comparing present-day isotope composition of the lake water to the past oxygen isotope composition of the lake water...

Tephra layers provide geologists and archaeologists with isochronous marker deposits, which, if interpreted correctly, can provide valuable chronostratigraphic information. Explosive volcanic activity in the Hellenic arc over the last 150 000 years has left a record of terrestrial, lacustrine and marine tephra deposits across the Aegean and western...

This paper offers an alternative to the use of geomorphological and sedimentological evidence for the reconstruction of flood and low flow frequencies. It is based on a technique developed to estimate the hydrological impact of future climate change and it uses either observed or calculated meteorological parameters. It is possible to use this meth...

The complexity of Balkan physical geography, together with its location in an important transition zone of faunal and floral influences, will have influenced greatly the evolution of Balkan biodiversity. This chapter gives a broad description of the geology, topography and climate of the Balkan Peninsula which serves as a reference point for subseq...

The countries of the Balkans and the eastern Mediterranean, located at the junction of three continental regions, are located in a climatically diverse region that has had a profound effect on the development of the fauna and flora. Zolitschka et al (2000) highlight the importance of palaeoecological research in this region across three broad front...

We present the first area-average time series reconstructions of warmest month, coldest month and mean annual surface air temperatures across Europe during the last 12,000 years. These series are based on quantitative pollen climate reconstructions from over 500 pollen sites assimilated using an innovative four-dimensional gridding procedure. This...

The oxygen and carbon stable-isotope ratios from fossil snail shells within a small intramontane lake in southwest Turkey are used to highlight the potential, and problems, of using freshwater snail carbonate as a palaeoenvironmental proxy. Two species (Gyraulus piscinarum and Valvata cristata) yielded different isotope ratios at the same sampling...

Volcanic glass from the seventeenth century BC (c. 3600 BP) Minoan eruption of Santorini (Thera) has been recovered from a 4 cm thick tephra deposit at Gölhisar Gölü, a small lake in SW Turkey. Analysis of single grains of this glass by laser ablation inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (LA-ICP-MS) provides, for the first time, an accurate...

A tephra layer originating from the mid-second millennium BC (3300 14C yr BP) ‘Minoan’ eruption of Santorini (or Thera) in the Aegean has been found in lake sediments at G6lhisar in southwest Turkey. Microstratigraphic analyses of tephra shard concentration (TSC), pollen, diatoms, sponge spicules and nonsiliceous microfossils in sediments from Gtlh...

A layer of volcanic ash (4 cm maximum recorded thickness) is present at ∼250 cm depth in littoral sediments of Gölhisar Gölü; a small intramontane lake in Southwest Turkey. The major-element glass chemistry, determined by electron microprobe, is characterised by a rhyolitic composition. Trace-element data, determined by solution inductively coupled...

Laser ablation inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (LA-ICP-MS) has been applied to the chemical analysis of fine-grained (125–250 μm) volcanic glass shards separated from tephra deposits. This has been used both for bulk sample analysis and for the analysis of individual shards. Initial work concentrated on the use of an infra-red (IR) las...

Percentage, concentration and accumulation pollen data together with diatom and non-siliceous microfossil data are presented for the site of Gölhisar Gölü (37°8′N, 29°36′E; elevation 930m), a small intramontane lake in Burdur Province, southwest Turkey. Microfossil assemblages from the longest sediment core (GHA: 813cm) record changes in local and...

The Late Quaternary environmental history of the Konya plain, in south central Turkey, is used to examine sediment facies changes in a shallow non-outlet basin which has experienced major climatically driven changes in lake extent. Two principal types of sedimentary archive are used to reconstruct a palaeoenvironmental record, namely alluvial seque...

The mountains of the Eastern Mediterranean have a long history of human occupation and exploitation of the natural environment (Grenon, Batisse 1989; McNeil 1992). Whilst the reconstruction of vegetation and human-induced landscape change is primarily based upon pollen analysis and other palaeoecological methods, the history of human occupation rel...

Laser ablation-inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry (LA-ICP-MS) has been applied to the analysis of fine-grained volcanic ash shards separated from a tephra layer deposited by the mid-second millenniumBC“Minoan” eruption of Santorini or Thera in Holocene lake sediments from Gölhisar Gölü, a small intramontane lake in southwest Turkey. In th...

Proxy records such as lake sediment sequences provide important data on abrupt environmental changes in the past, but establishing their specific causes from the palaeoenvironmental record can be problematic. Pollen diagrams from southwest Turkey show a mid-late Holocene pollen assemblage zone, designated as the Beyşehir Occupation phase, the onset...