Theme:
2. Net Zero Archaeologies – Sustainability in the Past, Present and Future
Session format:
Regular session
Title:
Eurasia before and after the 8.2 ka BP Event – A Significant Horizon of Cultural Change? [PaM]
Content:
The Early Holocene was a period of climate amelioration, yet paleoclimate records show punctuated episodes of climate change. Premier among these is the ‘8.2 ka BP event’. While centered on 8.2 ka BP, the duration of this abrupt cooling oscillation was likely much longer, and its onset reaching back to 8.4 ka BP. The synchronicity of the event across the Northern Hemisphere seems undisputed, but its specific regional climatic signature appears to have varied strongly. In some places, temperatures dropped sharply and precipitation decreased; elsewhere, sea-level rose or seasonality became more pronounced. The magnitude of these effects and how they triggered ecological and societal change appear to have been variable across Eurasia. Given this spatial variability, it is likely that this event would have had both positive and negative consequences on the exploited ecosystems, regarding resource availability and distribution, environmental productivity and carrying capacity. These variable environmental characteristics would in turn have imposed different limiting factors and adaptive pressures on contemporaneous human communities. This session seeks to bring together researchers from across Eurasia dealing with the impacts of the 8.2 ka BP event on human socio-ecological systems. Our aim is to take stock of the climatic, ecological, and cultural signals associated with this episode of within-Holocene climate change. We invite presentations focused on different ecological settings, and on different topics such as settlement patterns, subsistence, technology, or palaeodemography. The goal is to together review the variability of palaeoecological effects of the 8.2 ka BP event across Eurasia, and against this background to discuss the range of human responses to it. Our ambition is to chart the variable archaeological signatures of the adaptive strategies taken during this time of climatic upheaval, along with showcasing state-of-the-art methodological approaches and research designs able to address questions of resilience, vulnerability and human impacts.
Keywords:
Climate change, Mesolithic, Neolithic, Resilience, Vulnerability, Migration
Session associated with MERC:
no
Session associated with CIfA:
no
Session associated with SAfA:
no
Session associated with CAA:
no
Session associated with DGUF:
no
Session associated with other:
PaM
Main organiser:
José Ramón Rabuñal (Denmark) 1,2
Co-organisers:
Felix Riede (Denmark) 2
Mikael A. Manninen (Finland) 3
Javier Fernández-López de Pablo (Spain) 1
Affiliations:
1. Instituto Universitario de Investigación en Arqueología y Patrimonio Histórico (INAPH), University of Alicante.
2. Department of Archaeology and Heritage Studies, Aarhus University.
3. Ecosystems and Environment Research Programme and Helsinki Institute of Sustainability Science (HELSUS), Faculty of Biological and Environmental Sciences, University of Helsinki.
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