Eemian
The Eemian was the last interglacial period of the Pleistocene. It began about 130,000 years ago, and ended about 115,000 years ago at the beginning of the last glacial period.[1][2]
The Holocene is the present interglacial.
The Eemian is part of the Middle Paleolithic. It is of some interest to the evolution of "anatomically modern" humans. Modern humans existed at that time.[3]
Other names
The Eemian is known as the Ipswichian in the UK, the Mikulin interglacial in Russia, the Valdivia interglacial in Chile and the Riss-Würm interglacial in the Alps. Depending on how a specific publication defines the Sangamonian Stage of North America, the Eemian is equivalent to either all or part of it.
Climate
The Eemian climate was, on average, about 1° to 2°C (1.8° to 3.6°F) warmer than that of the Holocene.[4] During the Eemian, the proportion of CO2 in the atmosphere was about 280 parts per million.[5]
To give an idea of how warm it was, in Britain hippos were in the Thames and other rivers, and elephants were on land.[6][7] There are bones of large mammals under Trafalgar Square in London. The interglacial used to be called the "Trafalgar Square stage", and sometimes still is.[8][9]
Eemian Media
CO2 concentrations over the last 800,000 years as measured from ice cores
Pieter Harting (1886) assigned Bittium reticulatum as the index fossil for the Last Interglacial.
Global average temperature estimates for the last 540 My
Last Interglacial erosion surface in a fossil coral reef on Great Inagua, The Bahamas. Foreground shows corals truncated by erosion; behind the geologist is a post-erosion coral pillar which grew on the surface after sea level rose again.
References
- ↑ Dahl-Jensen, D.. Eemian interglacial reconstructed from a Greenland folded ice core. Nature 493 (7433) (2013). p. 489–94. doi:10.1038/nature11789.
- ↑ Shackleton, Nicholas J.. Marine Isotope Substage 5e and the Eemian Interglacial. Global and Planetary Change 36 (3) (2003). p. 151–155. doi:10.1016/S0921-8181(02)00181-9. Retrieved 2014-08-07.
- ↑ Human mitochondrial DNA and the evolution of homo sapiens (2006). Berlin: Springer. p. 233. ISBN 978-3-540-31789-0. OCLC 262692230.
- ↑ Current & historical global temperature graph.
- ↑ Earth is the warmest it's been in 120,000 years. Mashable (2018).
- ↑ Stuart A.J. 1974. Pleistocene: history of the British vertebrate fauna. Biological Reviews 49, 225–266.
- ↑ Stuart A.J. 1976. The history of the Pleistocene fauna during the Ipswichian/last interglacial in England. Phil. Trans. Royal Society B. 276, 221–250.
- ↑ Stuart A.J. 1982. Pleistocene vertebrates in the British Isles. London, Longmans. ISBN 9780582300699.
- ↑ Franks J.W. 1960. Interglacial deposits at Trafalgar Square, London. The New Phytologist 59 (2): 145–150.