Department of Earth and Environmental Science

Human responses to Holocene sea level change in the Persian Gulf

Working closely with Ubaid and Uruk period (6000-3000BC) archaeologists, to examine the affect of changing shorelines and environmental conditions on southern Mesopotamian civilizations.  The changing configuration of land, sea and marsh is thought to have had a profound impact on the settlement patterns and the economy of the region.  This formative period is of particular importance because it associated with the beginnings of urbanism, writing and highly complex society.  These developments may have been facilitated by the special advantage enjoyed by southern Mesopotamia as a result of its particular environmental situation.

To this end work is currently being undertaken to reconstruct Holocene sea levels and shorelines using foraminifera and lithological techniques.  Modern training sets have been collected from Kuwait and the area around Bushehr, Iran during fieldwork in 2004.  A number of extensive (up to 30m in length) cores from Bubiyan Island are the basis for paleoenvironmental investigation.  They are an unprecedented archive of environmental change.

In addition to supporting archaeological investigations, sea level reconstruction in this region provides an opportunity to undertake research in a much under studied part of the world.  Field observations will be used to calibrate a geophysical model and subsequently generate a series of Holocene shoreline maps, which will serve as an important tool in archaeological analysis.