PALEOHYDROLOGY OF THE LARGEST FRESHWATER LAKE IN CENTRAL EUROPE: RESULTS OF A MULTIPROXY PALEOECOLOGICAL STUDY FROM LAKE BALATON, WESTERN HUNGARY

The largest freshwater lake in Central Europe is located in Western Transdanubia ca.100 kms SW of the capital city Budapest. The lacustrine basin covering an area of 594 km2 is composed of a series of adjacent neotectonic basin, which emerged during the Late Glacial. The lake is fed by the Zala River on the west and is drained artificially since Roman times. As an important freshwater reservoir the fate of the lake is crucial in the light of expected global warming events. Climatically speaking it lies at the interface of two major climatic influences (Atlantic, Submediterranean). Extensive multiproxy analysis of a radiocarbon-dated core sequences taken along the northern shoreline enabled us to capture past fluctuations of the water level from ca 16 kys up to the Late Holocene. Results were compared with other global and European as well as North Atlantic paleoenvironmental proxies in order to highlight how lake levels fluctuated under climatic perturbations of the Late Glacial and the Holocene. Signals of Atlantic and/or Submediterranean climatic influences could have been attested in the paleorecord from the Holocene onwards.