Colluvial sediments originating from past land-use activities in the Erzgebirge Mountains, Central Europe: occurrence, properties, and historic environmental implications

Abstract

Colluvial sediments originating from soil erosion on slopes have proven to constitute significant evidence for tracing past human impact on mountain landscapes. In the Central European Erzgebirge (Ore) Mountains, colluvial sediments are associated with specific landforms (footslopes, slope flattenings, dells) and cover a share of 11% (11,905 ha) of the regional soil landscape. Thirteen pedosedimentary sections with colluvial layers were investigated at five forested sites (520–730 m a.s.l.) within a context of mining archaeology, integrating data from pedology, archaeology, palaeobotany, and geochronology. The thickness of the gravel-bearing loamy, silty, and sandy colluvial layers is up to 70 cm, which are mostly located on top of the sections. The geochronological ages and archaeological data reveal a high to late medieval to post-medieval age of the colluvial sediments. Pollen data show a drastic decline of the mountain forests in the late twelfth to fifteenth centuries AD accompanied by an increase of pioneer trees and spruce at the expense of fir and beech. The primary cause of soil erosion and subsequent colluvial deposition at the sites investigated is medieval to post-medieval mining and other early industrial activities. A compilation of 395 radiocarbon and OSL ages, obtained from colluvial sediments at 197 upland sites in Central Europe, shows that anthropogenically initiated colluvial dynamics go as far back as the late Bronze Age to the early Iron Age. Most ages derive from the medieval to post-medieval period, corresponding to the general intensification of settlement and land-use activities including deforestation and widespread ore mining.

Silver mining and landscape changes in medieval Central Europe: Reconstructing ore processing in a buried fir forest on the Bohemian‐Moravian Highlands (Koječín, Czech Republic)

“…Generally stronger share of conifers in the postmedieval forests in this region was recently formulated as a hypothesis (Szabó et al, 2017). However, according to regionally available pollen diagrams (Hrubý et al, 2014), Abies significantly declined after A.D. 1300, as in many lower mountain ranges in Central Europe as well (e.g., Kaiser et al, 2023). The regional data suggest that the expansion of Abies documented by historical records was rather localised (Kozáková et al, 2011).…”

“…Rural colonisation and the development of an early mining industry often took place simultaneously (Kenzler, 2012). This overall very complex economic–political–social process led ecologically to the first large‐scale deforestation of the uplands, resulting in tremendous soil erosion, silting up of valleys and other effects (Hoffmann et al, 2008; Kaiser et al, 2021; Migoń & Latocha, 2018; Tolksdorf et al, 2020). Together with mass movements that are directly linked to mining, ore processing and smelting, colluviation and alluviation often resulted in the widespread burial and subsequent preservation of former land surfaces.…”

Buried Podzols as a pedostratigraphic marker for the Medieval Climatic Optimum: Grębociny soil in the dune deposits of the European Sand Belt

“…The need for settlement and arable areas led to the most extensive clearing of central European forests up to that time (Williams, 2000). The record of these clearances in various sedimentary and dendrochronological geoarchives is an important field of Medieval environmental history studies (Kaiser et al, 2019(Kaiser et al, , 2021.…”

Holocene forest and land-use history of the Erzgebirge, central Europe: a review of palynological data

“…A rather new data source for the Erzgebirge is macroremain analysis, which has increasingly become available in the last decade, resulting from (geo-)archaeological investigations (e.g. Kočár et al, 2018;Tolksdorf, 2018;Kaiser et al, 2021;Herbig, 2022). The preferably determined herb and shrub species supplement the knowledge on late Holocene vegetation structure in various ecological details.…”

“…Initiated by current research on the medieval and early modern mining and environmental history in the Erzgebirge (e.g. Derner, 2018;Hemker, 2018;Tolksdorf, 2018;Cappenberg et al, 2020;Kaiser et al, 2021), the opportunity arose to systematically compile the palynological data available from the region, make it accessible for further research, and carry out overview analyses on it. This review paper therefore focuses on data presentation and certain data reflection, especially in methodical terms, as well as on selected research questions about regional forest and land-use dynamics in the Holocene.…”