The palaeoclimatic and palaeoceanographic history of the Gulf of Taranto (Mediterranean Sea) in the last 15 ky

A multidisciplinary study, which includes micropaleontology, sedimentology and geochemistry, was carried out on the TEA-C6 core, raised in the Gulf of Taranto (north-western Ionian Sea). The chronological framework was yielded by tephrostratigraphy combined with ecostratigraphy and AMS C-14 dating. New results allowed surface and bottom conditions in the Gulf of Taranto during the last 15 ky to be reconstructed, thus providing a detailed and age-constrained paleoclimate and paleocological record for this sector of the Mediterranean Sea. The quantitative record of past sea surface temperatures (SST) was obtained by means of Compositional Data Analysis (CoDA) methods applied to planktonic foraminifera assemblages. High-resolution analyses allowed the Sapropel Si event to be characterised at centennial-scale resolution. The main interval of the sapropel S1, here dated between 10.2 cal ka and 7.8 cal ka, is preceded and followed by transition phases spanning several centuries and prevailing anoxic bottom conditions are punctuated by several episodes of partial oxygen recovery. The S1a interval corresponds to high summer SST, whereas an SST drop of about 2.5 degrees took place towards the end of the S1b interval. New tephrochronological data record the signature of eruptive events from Italian volcanoes which were not documented on land up to date.