Soils of arid ecosystems of Kalmykia in the late Holocene

Abstract

Several dark-colored buried paleosols are studied in balkas (valley) in the south of Russia (Kalmykia Republic). The paleosols differ from modern soils by chemical and physical properties that indicate differences in the character of soil-forming processes in the past and in the present. The paleosols are buried under colluvial and eolian deposits, whose intensive accumulation followed the late Holocene climatic optimum (about 1,000 years ago). We hypothesize burial was caused by landscape erosion associated with social developments within this territory. One reason for simultaneous burial of soils within the large study area probably was catastrophic landscape erosion caused by immense flocks of sheep kept by tribes that occupied the territory of the collapsed Khazar state.