A comparative morphological, compositional and tl study of tenedos (Bozcaada) and Sile aeolianites, Turkey

Abstract

Aeolianites are carbonate-cemented deposits of coastal dune sands, mostly of Quaternary age. Even though aeolianite exposures on the coasts of the Mediterranean Sea are frequent, very few records have been documented from the coasts of either the Aegean or the Black Sea. The present study deals with evaluating and comparing both compositions and thermoluminescence (TL) ages of two recently reported samples of coastal aeolianites. Both were recovered at the Turkish coasts of Tenedos (Bozcaada) island, Aegean Sea and Şile, Western Black Sea. In the latter case, being the first record for the specific coastal area, the oldest age obtained was dated at 158±25 ka while the youngest age yielded was 108±14 ka. These values imply that both deposition and cementation occurred during the high sea stand of marine isotope stage 5 (MIS 5). In the case of Tenedos, the aeolianites were deposited between the early stage of the oxygen isotope stage 2 period (OIS 2) and the very late phase of the oxygen isotope stage 3 period (OIS 3). These latter TL results are in excellent agreement with a previous study of the same complex after applying OSL. Besides the ages, a number of luminescent features and properties in conjunction with compositional data suggest the dissimilarity for the quartz samples extracted from the aeolianites recovered at these two sampling sites, excluding thus any transport from one sampling site to the other, despite the short distance of the two sampling sites and the meteorological data regarding the preferable wind directions between them.