Book contents
- Quaternary of the Levant
- Quaternary of the Levant
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Contributors
- Acknowledgements
- 1 The Quaternary of the Levant
- Part I: The Evolution of Current Landscapes and Basins
- Part II: Palaeoclimates
- 8 Chronologies of Late Quaternary Coral Reefs and Lake Sediments from the Red Sea and Dead Sea Rift Valley
- 9 Sedimentology of the Lacustrine Formations in the Dead Sea Basin
- 10 The Amora Formation, Dead Sea Basin
- 11 The Stratigraphy and Chronology of the Samra Formation
- 12 Lake Lisan
- 13 Dead Sea Lake Level Changes and Levant Palaeoclimate
- 14 Pliocene–Pleistocene Water Bodies and Associated Deposits in Southern Israel and Southern Jordan
- 15 Quaternary Evolution of Caves and Associated Palaeoenvironments of the Southern Levant
- 16 Geoarchaeology of Levantine Prehistoric Caves
- 17 Climate and Environment Reconstructions Based on Speleothems from the Levant
- 18 Speleothems from Lebanon
- 19 Late Quaternary Palaeoenvironments in Northern Levant (Lebanon and Syria)
- Part III: Archaeology of Human Evolution
- Part IV: Palaeoecology
- Part V: Quaternary Geomorphology
- Part VI: Humans in the Levant
- Index
- Plate section
- References
14 - Pliocene–Pleistocene Water Bodies and Associated Deposits in Southern Israel and Southern Jordan
from Part II: - Palaeoclimates
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 04 May 2017
Book contents
- Quaternary of the Levant
- Quaternary of the Levant
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Contributors
- Acknowledgements
- 1 The Quaternary of the Levant
- Part I: The Evolution of Current Landscapes and Basins
- Part II: Palaeoclimates
- 8 Chronologies of Late Quaternary Coral Reefs and Lake Sediments from the Red Sea and Dead Sea Rift Valley
- 9 Sedimentology of the Lacustrine Formations in the Dead Sea Basin
- 10 The Amora Formation, Dead Sea Basin
- 11 The Stratigraphy and Chronology of the Samra Formation
- 12 Lake Lisan
- 13 Dead Sea Lake Level Changes and Levant Palaeoclimate
- 14 Pliocene–Pleistocene Water Bodies and Associated Deposits in Southern Israel and Southern Jordan
- 15 Quaternary Evolution of Caves and Associated Palaeoenvironments of the Southern Levant
- 16 Geoarchaeology of Levantine Prehistoric Caves
- 17 Climate and Environment Reconstructions Based on Speleothems from the Levant
- 18 Speleothems from Lebanon
- 19 Late Quaternary Palaeoenvironments in Northern Levant (Lebanon and Syria)
- Part III: Archaeology of Human Evolution
- Part IV: Palaeoecology
- Part V: Quaternary Geomorphology
- Part VI: Humans in the Levant
- Index
- Plate section
- References
Summary
Fine-grained, calcareous deposits associated with past water bodies are common features of arid environments worldwide. Distinguishing the hydrologic setting of these water bodies is crucial for reconstructing past climate and deducing the paleoecology of past human cultures that lived adjacent to them. In the southern Levant, fine-grained, calcareous, and often fossiliferous deposits have been used to infer large, shallow lakes during the Pleistocene. Here we assess the geologic evidence for three reported paleolakes on the southern Jordan Plateau: Wadi Hasa, Al Jafr Basin, and Mudawwara Basin. Based on the spatial distribution, sedimentological facies, and fossil assemblages of these deposits, we conclude that the water bodies in Wadi Hasa and Al Jafr Basin were formed by ground water discharging at the surface and maintaining wetland environments, not lakes. In Mudawwara, it is unclear if the deposits are associated with a former lake or wetland environments. The presence of wetland environments in the southern Levant indicates wetter conditions in the past, but they do not require the extreme changes in effective moisture needed to maintain large, shallow lakes.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Quaternary of the LevantEnvironments, Climate Change, and Humans, pp. 127 - 134Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2017
References
Abed, A.M., Yasin, S., Sadaqa, R. & Al-Hawari, Z. 2008. The paleoclimate of the eastern desert of Jordan during marine isotope stage 9. Quaternary Research 69: 458–68.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Armitage, S.J., Jasim, S.A., Marks, A.E. et al. 2011. The southern route ‘out of Africa’: Evidence for an early expansion of modern humans into Arabia. Science 331: 453–6.Google Scholar
Bender, F. 1968. Geologie von Jordanien. Beiträge zur Regionalen Geologie der Erde Vol. 7. Stuttgart: Gebrüder Borntraeger.Google Scholar
Clark, G.A. 1984. The Negev model for paleoclimatic change and human adaptation in the Levant and its relevance for the paleolithic of the Wadi el Hasa (West-Central Jordan). Annual of the Department of Antiquities of Jordan 28: 225–48.Google Scholar
Clark, G.A., Neeley, M.P., MacDonald, B., Schuldenrein, J. & Amr, K. 1992. Wadi al-Hasa Paleolithic Project – 1992 Preliminary Report. Annual of the Department of Antiquities of Jordan 36: 13–23.Google Scholar
Coinman, N.R. 2003. The Upper Paleolithic of Jordan: New data from the Wadi al-Hasa. In More than Meets the Eye: Studies on Upper Paleo-lithic Diversity in the Near East, ed. Goring-Morris, N. & Belfer-Cohen, A.. Oxford: Oxbow, pp. 151–70.Google Scholar
Copeland, L. & Vita-Finzi, C. 1978. Archaeological dating of geological deposits in Jordan. Levant 10: 10–25.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Davies, C.P. 2005. Quaternary paleoenvironments and potential for human exploitation of the Jordan Plateau desert interior. Geoarchaeology: An International Journal 20: 381–400.Google Scholar
Edwards, R.L., Gallup, C.D. & Cheng, H. 2003. Uranium-series dating of marine and lacustrine carbonates. Reviews in Mineralogy and Geochemistry 52: 363–405.Google Scholar
Enzel, Y., Amit, R., Dayan, U. et al. 2008. The climatic and physiographic controls of the eastern Mediterranean over the Late Pleistocene climates in the southern Levant and its neighboring deserts. Global and Planetary Change 60: 165–92.Google Scholar
Ginat, H., Zilberman, E. & Saragusti, I. 2003. Early Pleistocene lake deposits and Lower Paleolithic finds in Nahal (wadi) Zihor, southern Negev desert, Israel. Quaternary Research 59: 445–58.Google Scholar
Groucutt, H.S. & Petraglia, M.D. 2012. The prehistory of the Arabian Peninsula: Deserts, dispersals, and demography. Evolutionary Anthropology 21: 113–25.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Huckriede, R. & Wiesemann, G. 1968. Der jungpleistozäne Pluvial-See von El-Jafr und weitere Daten zum Quartär Jordaniens. Geologica et Paleontologica 2: 73–95.Google Scholar
Kaufman, A., Broecker, W.S., Ku, T.L. & Thurber, D.L. 1971. The status of U-series methods of mollusk dating. Geochimica et Cosmochimica Acta 35: 1155–83.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Masri, A. 1988. The Geology of Halat Ammar and Al Mudawwara Map Sheet Nos. 3248 III, 3248 IV. Amman: Geological Mapping Division, Natural Resources Authority, Geology Directorate, The Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan.Google Scholar
Miller, D.M. 2012. Surficial Geologic Map of the Ivanpah 30′ × 60′ Quadrangle (1:100,000), San Bernardino County, California, and Clark County, Nevada. US Geological Survey Scientific Investigations Map 3206.Google Scholar
Mischke, S., Ginat, H., Al-Saqarat, B. & Almogi-Labin, A. 2012. Ostracods from water bodies in hyperarid Israel and Jordan as habitat and water chemistry indicators. Ecological Indicators 14: 87–99.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mischke, S., Opitz, S., Kalbe, J., Ginat, H. & Al-Saqarat, B. 2015. Palaeo-environmental inferences from late Quaternary sediments of the Al Jafr Basin, Jordan. Quaternary International 382: 154–67.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Moumani, K. 2005. Geological Map of Al Jafr. Sheet 325. Amman: Geological Mapping Division, Natural Resources Authority, Geology Directorate, The Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan.Google Scholar
Moumani, K., Alexander, J. & Bateman, M.D. 2003. Sedimentology of the late Quaternary Wadi Hasa Marl Formation of central Jordan: A record of climate variability. Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology 191: 221–42.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Parton, A., White, T.S., Parker, A.G. et al. 2015. Orbital-scale climate variability in Arabia as a potential motor for human dispersals. Quaternary International 382: 82–97.Google Scholar
Petit-Maire, N., Carbonel, P., Reyss, J.L. et al. 2010. A vast Eemian palaeo-lake in southern Jordan (29° N). Global and Planetary Change 72: 368–73.Google Scholar
Pigati, J.S., Bright, J.E., Shanahan, T.M. & Mahan, S.A. 2009. Late Pleistocene paleohydrology near the boundary of the Sonoran and Chihuahuan Deserts, southeastern Arizona, USA. Quaternary Science Reviews 28: 286–300.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pigati, J.S., Miller, D.M., Bright, J. et al. 2011. Chronology, sedimentology, and microfauna of ground-water discharge deposits in the central Mojave Desert, Valley Wells, California. Geological Society of America Bulletin 123: 2224–39.Google Scholar
Pigati, J.S., Rech, J.A., Quade, J. & Bright, J. 2014. Desert wetlands in the geologic record. Earth-Science Reviews 132, 67–81.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Quade, J. 1986. Late Quaternary environmental changes in the upper Las Vegas Valley, Nevada. Quaternary Research 26: 340–57.Google Scholar
Quade, J., Mifflin, M.D., Pratt, W.L., McCoy, W.D. & Burckle, L. 1995. Fossil spring deposits in the southern Great Basin and their implications for changes in water-table levels near Yucca Mountain, Nevada, during Quaternary time. Geological Society of America Bulletin 107: 213–30.Google Scholar
Quade, J., Forester, R.M., Pratt, W.L. & Carter, C. 1998. Black mats, spring-fed streams, and late-glacial-age recharge in the southern Great Basin. Quaternary Research 49: 129–48.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Quade, J., Rech, J.A., Betancourt, J.L. & Latorre, C.H. 2008. Paleowetlands and regional climate change in the central Atacama Desert, northern Chile. Quaternary Research 69: 343–60.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rech, J.A., Quade, J. & Betancourt, J.L. 2002. Late Quaternary paleohydrology of the central Atacama Desert, Chile (22°–24° S), Geological Society of America Bulletin 114: 334–48.2.0.CO;2>CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rech, J.A., Pigati, J.S., Quade, J. & Betancourt, J.L. 2003. Re-evaluation of Holocene deposits at Quebrada Puripica, northern Chile, Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology 194: 207–22.Google Scholar
Rech, J.A., Quintero, L.A., Wilke, P.J. & Winer, E.R. 2007. The Lower Paleolithic landscape of `Ayoun Qedim, Jordan. Geoarchaeology: An International Journal 22: 261–75.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schuldenrein, J. & Clark, G.A. 1994. Landscape and prehistoric chronology of west-central Jordan. Geoarchaeology: An International Journal 9: 31–55.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schuldenrein, J. & Clark, G.A. 2001. Prehistoric landscapes and settlement geography along the Wadi Hasa, west-central Jordan. Part I: Geo-archaeology, human palaeoecology and ethnographic modeling. Environmental Archaeology 6: 25–40.Google Scholar
Schuldenrein, J. & Clark, G.A. 2003. Prehistoric landscapes and settlement geography along the Wadi Hasa, west-central Jordan. Part II: Towards a model of palaeoecological settlement for the Wadi Hasa. Environmental Archaeology 8: 1–16.Google Scholar
Vita-Finzi, C. 1964. Observations on the late Quaternary of Jordan. Palestine Exploration Quarterly 96: 19–33.Google Scholar
Winer, E.R. 2010. Interpretation and Climatic Significance of Late Quaternary Valley-Fill Deposits in Wadi Hasa, West-Central Jordan. Unpublished M.Sc. thesis, Miami University.Google Scholar
Yasin, S. 2001. Quaternary Palaeolimnology of the Mudawwara Area (Southern Jordan, 29° N), Paleoclimatic Implications. Unpublished Ph.D. thesis, University of Jordan.Google Scholar
Zierholz, C., Prosser, I.P., Fogarty, P.J. & Rustomji, P. 2001. In-stream wetlands and their significance for channel fillings and the catchment sediment budget, Jugiong Creek, New South Wales. Geomorphology 38: 221–35.Google Scholar
- 6
- Cited by