Chronology of soil evolution and climatic changes in the dry steppe zone of the Northern Caucasus, Russia, during the 3rd millennium BC.

Abstract

Chrono-sequences of paleosols buried under different mounds of the large Ipatovo Kurgan, constructed during the Bronze age, have been studied to reconstruct climatic changes in the dry steppe zone of the Northern Caucasus, Russia. Abrupt climatic and environmental changes in the third millennium BC have been reconstructed, using morphological and analytical data of the soil. Based on accelerator mass spectrometry (AMS) dates of small charcoal fragments from the soil chrono-sequence, we concluded that two upper paleosols (with the clearest evidence of arid pedogenesis) developed between about 2600-2450 BC.