++please forward to all relevant forums++
Just published in Internet Archaeology 11:
A GIS-based Vegetation Map of the World at the Last Glacial Maximum
(25,000-15,000 BP)
by N. Ray (University of Geneva) and J.M. Adams (Wesleyan University,
Connecticut)
http://intarch.ac.uk/journal/issue11/rayadams_index.html
There has been a great deal of interest in climate fluctuations which have
occurred repeatedly during the Quaternary period, and in archaeology, it
is becoming increasingly necessary to study the shifting climatic and
ecological background to regions if an understanding of the behaviour and
movements of peoples is to be reached. Yet archaeologists and
anthropologists, together with other Quaternary scientists, often have
difficulty obtaining the basic background information which exists in such
a scattered form throughout the literature.
Assembling data and opinion from the many scientists who currently work on
vegetation reconstruction for this period, the authors of this article
have set out to address this basic problem.
Pulling the evidence together in the form of a series of preliminary maps,
the authors set out to depict the vegetation patterns at the Last Glacial
Maximum (25,000-15,000 BP). The article also summarises and details the
principal literature sources of evidence on Late Quaternary
palaeovegetation and climates.
As well as providing a ready source of information for archaeologists, the
maps in particular (also available for download) may prove useful to those
within the Quaternary palaeoecology community. As a coherent picture of
global vegetation for this particular interval in the past, this article
should at least act as a baseline for further work in vegetation
reconstruction.
Please note: Access to the full text of Internet Archaeology is now
available to subscribers only. Please see
http://intarch.ac.uk/subscriptions.html for details.
Judith
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Judith Winters, Editor - Internet Archaeology http://intarch.ac.uk
Department of Archaeology, University of York,
King's Manor, YO1 7EP, UK
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