Exkursion: Massif Central Auvergne 2016 Part 1 - Feldbuchabschrift mit Fotos (original) (raw)

Exkursion: Massif Central Auvergne 2016 Part 2 - Feldbuchabschrift mit Fotos

2016

Geological Excursion (Volcanology): Massif Central, Auvergne, Excursion May 13th - 20th, 2016 - Fieldbook notes from a Senior Student. Part 2 locations: Sessalier, Puy Mary, La Chaine de Puys. - see also Part 1 locations: Limagne Rift, Le Puy de Bane, Carriere du Grand Gandaillat, La Chaine de Puys, Monts Dore Volcanic Province, Massif du Sancy, Volcan Le Lemptegy.

Landscape human shaping and spatial mobility of agropastoral practices in the Chaîne des Puys during historical times (Massif Central, France)

Quaternary International, 2011

"The Chaîne des Puys is a great collection of extinct volcanoes that cover the Hercynian basement and belongs to the Auvergne Volcanoes Natural Regional Park. Both the sedimentary record and the historical archives of this area are numerous. However, the cores studied hitherto do not offer a good knowledge of the historical dynamics because most of the wetlands have dried out during historical times, causing gaps in the sedimentary record and pollen oxidization. Moreover, all the studied cores are located on the crystalline basement or on an old volcanic one predating the Chaîne des Puys. Thus they do not directly provide information about the volcanoes. This article presents the only core obtained from a site, a small maar, located on a volcano. The sequence is short but does not have the same sedimentary gaps as the others. Owing to physical (grain size), chemical (C, N, P, K, Ca, Mg, NeNO3, NeNH4), palaeoecological (pollen and non-pollen palynomorphs) and historical analyses, this study gives a more precise recording of the landscape changes during the last 500 years in the volcanic area and contributes to the knowledge of the Chaîne des Puys landscape. It illustrates the mobility of the historical landscape, in particular the progression and regression of the forest and the erosive crises related to more intensive grazing activity. The observations are linked with the social and economical changes, especially with the consequences of the French Revolution and the rural depopulation. This landscape history gives data about the direction of changes to the landscape preservationists. They demonstrate that even if the Chaîne des Puys landscape looks natural, it has been shaped by a very specific socio-economical system inherited from the Middle Ages. These aspects could be integrated in a management plan."

Mayoral et al Milcent 2018 Geoarchaeology Corent Lac du Puy accepted preprint

This paper presents the first results of the geoarchaeological study of an unusual hilltop wetland, located within the protohistoric proto-urban site of Corent in the French Massif Central. This small depression offers an exceptionally local sedimentary record that provided valuable data on long-term human–environment interactions, as well as proto urbanization of the first millennium B.C.E. Field survey revealed a major archaeological discovery: a large ensemble of 114 Iron Age storage pits excavated in clayey deposits. The geoarchaeological analysis of stratigraphic logs and cross-sections completed by geophysical survey and radiocarbon dating allowed us to refine the chronology of these structures. Here, we suggest these structures are probably contemporary with the Hallstatt occupation of the site (600–425 B.C.E.), consistent with the emergence at Corent of a short-lived proto-urban environment during this period. These investigations also allowed us to characterize the main evolution phases of the basin and the diversity of human impacts from first disturbance in the Early Neolithic to its final destruction in the Roman period. These findings highlight the nonlinear nature of the socio-environmental interactions and the definitive shift to an “anthroposystem” as a consequence of major disturbance in the first Iron Age, centuries before the development of urban settlements in the oppida period.