A new approach for palaeoaltitude estimates based on pollen records: example of the Mercantour Massif (southeastern France) at the earliest Pliocene

作者：Fauquette, S^*; Clauzon, G; Suc, JP; Zheng, Z

来源：Earth and Planetary Science Letters, 1999, 170(1-2): 35-47.

DOI：10.1016/S0012-821X(99)00093-X

• attitude
• Southern Alps
• lower Pliocene
• pollen
• climate
• geomorphology

The attitude of the Mercantour Massif (Southern Alps, France) during the earliest Pliocene has been estimated using a new quantification method. Instead of classical methods using geomorphologic criteria, our method uses biogeographic and climatologic criteria: composition of the modern vegetation belts in the European and peri-Mediterranean mountains, and Pliocene annual temperature estimates obtained from fossil pollen data. The climatic transfer function indicates for the coastal earliest Pliocene of the studied area a mean annual temperature of 16.5 degrees C. Such a temperature today occurs at 38.5 degrees N latitude in the Mediterranean region. The relation established by Ozenda between the present-day vertical and latitudinal vegetation assemblages evidences a shift of, on average in Western Europe, 110 m in altitude per degree in latitude. As a consequence, it is possible, taking into account that the Pliocene lapse rate was almost similar to the modem one, to estimate the minimum altitude of the massif at the earliest Pliocene. The so-obtained palaeoaltitude estimate is close to that obtained with the geomorphological method: the Mercantour Massif was almost 2000 meters high at the earliest Pliocene.

• 出版日期1999-6-30
• 单位中山大学