Chronological data from Estonian Pleistocene

Abstract

. Pleistocene chronostratigraphy in Estonia is based on 60 radiocarbon ( 14 C, 14 C AMS), 63 TL/OSL, and 17 10 Be datings from 57 studied sites/sections that cover a time span from approximately 200 000 yr BP to the Pleistocene–Holocene chronostratigraphic boundary. For the first time all scattered data from 40 years of chronological study into Estonian Pleistocene are presented together and critically analysed in regard to validity of obtained ages. Half of the relatively abundant but scattered chronological data cover only the youngest 5000–6000 year part of the Late Weichselian. New OSL datings, together with the results of earlier palynological, carpological, and diatom studies, have invalidated almost one-third of the available 14 C dates, obtained mostly in the late 1960s and 1970s. Thermoluminescence ages from tills, available from the early 1980s, are very inconsistent within the studied sections and are considered to be unreliable because of questionable bleaching of the TL signal. The results of the 10 Be method, recently applied to the study of deglaciation chronology of the Estonian territory, do not contradict the earlier age estimations. However, due to relatively large uncertainties of the method, the results were not able to refine the existing Late-Glacial chronology in Estonia.