Abstract
Estimates for the timing of the arrival of Danube sediment to the Black Sea range from Messinian to Pleistocene; the river is currently the largest sediment contributor, supplying 88 MT/yr. We identify two changes in siltstone provenance-sensitive heavy mineral abundances at DSDP site 380/380A in the southwest Black Sea. Comparison with modern river sediment compositions indicates that siltstones above 571.5 mbsf (metres below sea floor) were supplied by the Danube, while sediments below 651.0 m were sourced by other supply systems. Palaeo-magnetic, 40Ar/39Ar and biostratigraphic data reveal that the influx of Danube-supplied sediment to the southwest Black Sea began between 4.36 ± 0.19 Ma and 1 Ma ago (Zanclean–Calabrian). Our results provide an independent time constraint on palaeogeographic reconstructions of the Pannonian and Dacian basins, which acted as upstream sediment sinks, and suggest that significant volumes of Danube-supplied sediment only started to reach the Black Sea at least 1 Ma after the Messinian Salinity Crisis (5.971–5.33 Ma) had ended.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 114-124 |
| Number of pages | 11 |
| Journal | Terra Nova |
| Volume | 30 |
| Issue number | 2 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - Apr 2018 |
Funding
We thank Eduardo Garzanti for access to modern river samples from the western Pontides and Michael Flowerdew, Mike Curtis and Andy Whitham for critically reviewing an earlier version of this manuscript. We are also grateful to Gabor Tari for his timely notification of the two large mass transport complexes present in the interval drilled at the DSDP 380/380A site. Tom Hoyle is thanked for discussions on DSDP palynology. This research used samples provided by the Integrated Ocean Drilling Program (IODP). The staff at the IODP Bremen Core Repository are thanked for their help during sampling. We also thank Stephen Andrews, Mette Olivarius, an anonymous reviewer, editor Max Coleman and an anonymous associate editor for their positive and helpful criticism. The research was funded by CASP’s industrial sponsors. It is Cambridge Earth Sciences contribution esc.4048.