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4000 years of human impact and vegetation change in the central Peruvian Andes — with events parallelling the Maya record?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 January 2015

A. J. Chepstow-Lusty ,
K. D. Bennett ,
V. R. Switsur  and
A. Kendall
A. J. Chepstow-Lusty
Affiliation:
Department of Plant Sciences, University of Cambridge, Downing Street, Cambridge CB2 3EA, England
K. D. Bennett
Affiliation:
Department of Plant Sciences, University of Cambridge, Downing Street, Cambridge CB2 3EA, England
V. R. Switsur
Affiliation:
Godwin Laboratory, Free School Lane, Cambridge CB2 3RS, England
A. Kendall
Affiliation:
The Cusichaca Trust, Springfields, 62 High Street, Belbroughton, Stourbridge DY9 9SU, England
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Extract

A lake-sediment sequence from Marcacocha in the central Peruvian Andes provides a well-dated and continuous vegetation record from an area rich in Inca and pre-Inca remains over the last 4000 years. Climatic changes in this record at AD 1–100 and AD 900–1050 seem to be broadly contemporaneous with major arid events from Lake Chichancanab, Mexico, affecting the Maya civilization and corroborated by the Quelccaya and Huascaran ice cores in Peru.

Type
Papers
Information
Antiquity , Volume 70 , Issue 270 , December 1996 , pp. 824 - 833
Copyright
Copyright © Antiquity Publications Ltd. 1996

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