Scenarios, timing and paleo-environmental indicators for the identification of Anthropocene in the vegetal landscape of the Central Pyrenees (NE Iberia)

Abstract

The Anthropocene is related to the origin of current landscape configuration, and in terms of vegetation, with the consideration of human action as main forcing of clear, intense and permanent changes through time. In this paper we compile and compare data from palynological sequences, microcharcoal records, archaeological sites and radiocarbon dates from palaeofires located in the Central Pyrenees besides historical documents, and we argue that some evidences related to early deforestation processes and use of human fire are not so clear than some authors point. Conversely, indicators of unequivocal human use and the origin of cultural landscapes are located only a few centuries and not a few millennia ago. In fact, high temporal and spatial variability is recorded until the Middle Ages (last 700 years, 1300 AD), when a series of consistent and permanent changes suggest the onset of the Anthropocene.