Behre, Karl-Ernst; van der Knaap, W.O. (Pim) (2023). Pleistocene history of vegetation and flora. In: Lang, Gerhard; Ammann, Brigitta; Behre, Karl-Ernst; Tinner, Willy (eds.) Quaternary Vegetation Dynamics of Europe (pp. 73-134). Bern: Haupt Verlag
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Before the Pleistocene: the Tertiary
Most of the stock of species that dominated European vegetation in the Quaternary developed during the Tertiary but the first steps had already been made in the preceding Cretaceous. Ferns and gymnosperms prevailed in the lower Cretaceous and from the Middle Cretaceous the Angiosperms emerged and evolved rapidly. At the transition to the Tertiary the latter were already present with many species and had often replaced the archaic plant communities. Most of the modern families and genera already existed at the onset of the Tertiary. Their differentiation into species resulted in the situation that, already in the Miocene, fossil plant remains show only slight differences from modern species.
In the course of the Tertiary, European vegetation development was for the most part determined by changes in geography, geology and climate. In this process, plate tectonics played an important role. In the preceding geological formations the Eurasian Plate and the African Plate were separated by sea-floor spreading. This led to a wide, west–east, world-spanning sea-belt: the Tethys that reached as far as east Asia. It is in the Tethys and its lateral seas that the calcareous Mesozoic and Old-Tertiary sediments, which are frequently encountered in central Europe and the Mediterranean region, were deposited. In the course of crustal movements starting in the Middle Cretaceous the African Plate shifted northwards.
Item Type: |
Book Section (Book Chapter) |
|---|---|
Division/Institute: |
08 Faculty of Science > Department of Biology > Institute of Plant Sciences (IPS) 08 Faculty of Science > Department of Biology > Institute of Plant Sciences (IPS) > Palaeoecology |
UniBE Contributor: |
van der Knaap, Pim |
Subjects: |
500 Science > 580 Plants (Botany) |
ISBN: |
978-3-25808214-1 |
Publisher: |
Haupt Verlag |
Language: |
English |
Submitter: |
Peter Alfred von Ballmoos-Haas |
Date Deposited: |
08 Aug 2023 11:45 |
Last Modified: |
04 Sep 2023 14:29 |
BORIS DOI: |
10.48350/185284 |
URI: |
https://boris.unibe.ch/id/eprint/185284 |
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