Vegetation history of Lago Battaglia (eastern Gargano coast, Apulia, Italy) during the middle-late Holocene

A pollen and charcoal record from Gargano (southern Italy) provides new information on the vegetation history and environmental change in southern Italy during the middle to late Holocene. The chronological framework is provided by six AMS radiocarbon dates carried out on plant macroremains. Pollen diagrams record a Mediterranean vegetation along the coastland and a stable mixed oak forest at higher elevations between ca. 5900 and 4200 cal B.P. A sharp and dramatic fall of tree pollen concentrations and a change in fire frequencies occurred from approximately 4200 cal B.P. suggesting a climate change towards drier conditions. This event is coherent with regional and extra-regional palaeoclimatic records that suggest that a mid-Holocene dry period was experienced in southern Italy, southern Spain, and perhaps further afield. Human impact on vegetation seems to have occurred since about 2700 cal B.P.