Abstract
Application of relative and absolute dating techniques in the Alpine environment - The Late Pleistocene and Early
Holocene climate oscillation and the Alpine landscape evolution of Val di Rabbi (Trentino, Italy) were reconstructed using a combined
methodology of relative and absolute dating techniques. The research was carried out in the following four steps: 1) an earlier study
examined the investigated area (aerial photos, soil mapping etc.) to detect and sample the most representative sites (soils and boulders);
2) the extraction of the oldest organic matter fraction from the soil profiles followed by radiocarbon dating; 3) the comparison of the
14C dating results with the 10Be age sequence from representative boulders; 4) the addition of relative dating techniques to the absolute
ones to detect signals of Alpine landscape evolution. We found close links among the results obtained from the relative dating and the
absolute ones, showing the dynamics of an Alpine landscape within a relatively small area. The combination of relative and absolute
dating techniques is a promising tool for the reconstruction of landscape history and to detect human influences in high-elevation Alpine
areas on siliceous substrates.
Favilli, F