Tobratov S.A., Zheleznova O.S.

Caspian Sea dynamic cycles and their paleo-landscape indicators in the center of the Russian Plain. Pp.182-212.

UDC 551.465(262.81)

DOI 10.37724/RSU.2025.87.2.018

 

Abstract. Based on the results of paleogeographic studies in the Middle Oka basin and on literature, a graph of Caspian Sea level fluctuations over the last 12,000 years has been developed. The alternation of regressions and transgressions of the Caspian Sea clearly manifests global 1650-year Petterson-Shnitnikov cycles, and the natural processes in the Caspian basin are synchronous with hydroclimatic phenomena in the tropics and subtropics of Eurasia and other continents. The material evidence is presented of increasing climate moisture of the Russian Plain 8.8–8.1 thousand years ago (Dagestan transgression), extreme aridization 8.0–7.4 and 4.9–4.3 thousand years ago (Zhilandy and Izberbash regressions), large-scale fires in the Meshchera lowland synchronous with the regressive oscillation of the Caspian Sea in the 15th–16th centuries. We discuss the fine temporal structure of the Holocene climatic optimum in the center of the Russian Plain (6.5–5.8 thousand years ago), represented by the alternation of 150–200-year thermohumid and thermoarid subphases, with the corresponding 14C dating. We note the consequences for the region in the form a denudation surge 5.6–5.0 thousand years ago (the “World Flood” epoch) and of fluvial processes 4.2–4.0 thousand years ago (Turaly transgression). The close connection of the Caspian Sea regime with climatic pulsations in the center of the Russian Plain is emphasized, which makes it possible to use paleo-landscape relics as indicators of its past states.

 

Keywords: Holocene, paleo-landscape relics, natural cyclicity, radiocarbon dating, Petterson-Shnitnikov rhythms, Caspian Sea level.

 

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