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48 - Quaternary Fluvial Environments and Palaeohydrology in Syria

from Part V: - Quaternary Geomorphology

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  04 May 2017

Yehouda Enzel
Affiliation:
Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Ofer Bar-Yosef
Affiliation:
Harvard University, Massachusetts
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Summary

Quaternary fluvial environments in Syria have attracted attention because ancient people tended to live along major rivers such as the Euphrates. Geomorphological studies in Syria before the Syrian Civil War indicate marked changes in fluvial environments in response to late Quaternary climatic changes. This chapter summarizes studies of Quaternary fluvial environments in Syria. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, studies dealing with Syrian fluvial palaeoenvironments increased with more studies conducted on fluvial landforms and deposits in the 1990s and 2000s. The results of various studies suggest the following trend of change in the fluvial environment: 1) MIS 3-4, large-scale fluvial deposition, wet climate; 2) LGM, relatively stable or fluvial erosion with calcareous cementation under a dry climate but relatively abundant surface water; 3) Late Glacial and early Holocene fluvial/debris-flow deposition, wet climate; 4) Mid Holocene, temporal flood and small-scale fluvial deposition, relatively wet climate; and 5) Late Holocene, limited geomorphic changes, dry climate.
Type
Chapter
Information
Quaternary of the Levant
Environments, Climate Change, and Humans
, pp. 417 - 422
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2017

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