LATER QUATERNARY HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH CHANNEL

Evidence for sea-level high and low-stand environments characterise both the terrestrial and shallow marine environments of the English Channel (La Manche). Well-preserved sequences of raised marine deposits are known from both the English and French sides of the Channel and they are particularly well preserved in the Normandy and Sussex areas. In Sussex at least 4 spatially- and temporally-discrete high sea level stand events have been demonstrated. Evidence for the oldest Pleistocene marine incursion into the Sussex coastal plain area is currently thought to date to 450-500 ka B.P. while the youngest incursion occurred during the last interglacial (Ipswichian, Eemian). While many of the sequences indicate deposition under conditions as warm as the present-day, sediments thought to date to the penultimate interglacial appear to have accumulated during cooler water conditions.

Elsewhere important sequences of fluvial sands and gravels are associated with many of the river valley, particularly including the Seine, Somme and former Solent River. However, despite a number of recent investigations focused on these different elements of the Channel system, it remains difficult to integrate the evidence from sea-level high and low-stand phases and consequently a precise history of the region remains to be determined.

Elucidation of the sequence of events in the Channel region has important implications for our understanding of regional palaeogeographies as well as the human colonisation of the islands of Great Britain. Furthermore the area contains important sequences that will contribute to our understanding of palaeoceanographic changes in the NE Atlantic area during the later Middle and Upper Pleistocene.