Evidence of prehistoric and early medieval agriculture and its impact on soil and land relief transformation in the Białowieża natural forest (NE Poland)

Krupski, Mateusz; Kruczkowska, Bogusława; Kittel, Piotr; Jakubczak, Michał; Skrzyński, Grzegorz; Golyeva, Alexandra; Niedziółka, Kamil; Urbańczyk, Przemysław

doi:10.1016/j.geoderma.2021.115668

Cited by 4 publications

(1 citation statement)

References 80 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…Presently, the most common concepts assume Chernozems development in Central Europe under open-canopy broadleaf forests or in an open woodland-grassland landscape created in the course of anthropogenic activity during the Neolithic [12,20,21]. Studies focused on the origin and transformation of soils in relation to covering vegetation, may also offer useful proxy information for the identification of agricultural practices, what has large importance for archeological reconstructions of ancient human activity and its impact on the environment [22,23]. Typically, reconstructions of environmental conditions of Chernozem development and existence are based on analyses of vegetation residues, such as pollen grains, phytoliths and charcoal particles preserved in soil [24].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Application of Infrared Spectroscopy Techniques for Identification of Ancient Vegetation and Soil Change on Loess Areas

Dudek

Kabała

Łabaz

et al. 2022

Land

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The discussion on the formation of Chernozems still has no consensus, and one of the outstanding questions is the type of the vegetation that supported the persistence of these soils in Central Europe over the Holocene period. The transformation of Chernozems and related soil types may be clarified by paleoenvironmental studies, which integrate different investigation techniques and proxy data. We propose a procedure based on infrared reflectance spectroscopy of soil organic matter, that presumably contains specific fingerprints from land use and plant cover. A database of spectra for 337 samples representing vegetation classes (grassland, woodland and arable) and loess soil types (Chernozem, Phaeozem, Luvisol) was created to build a mathematical model, which allows to identify the origin of buried soils with unknown history. The comparison confirmed the applicability of both near-infrared and mid-infrared spectroscopy, with higher statistical affinity of MIR. A clear disjunction of land use/vegetation classes was proven and allowed reliable association of the samples from buried soils with grassland/woodland and episodes of arable land use, followed by prevailing forest vegetation after burial. The findings are consistent with proposed models in Poland and Czechia, and confirm the potential of spectroscopy techniques in identification of soil types and their evolution.

show abstract