Studies of the post-glacial history of British vegetation - III. Fenland polen diagrams - IV. Post-glacial changes of relative land- and sea-level in the English Fenland

Abstract

Since 1932 the Cambridge Fenland Research Committee has been engaged in solving the problem of the history of the deposits of the Fenland basin, by the many methods appropriate to the archaeologists, geologists, geographers and botanists who make up that body. Since so large a part of the Fenland basin is filled with peat or with alternating beds of peat or silt, a study of vegetational development in the area has inevitably meant co-ordination of botanical work with that of specialists in other subjects, and has led, in itself, to a study of Fenland stratigraphy. In the two preceding papers of this series an account has been given of the stratigraphy of the southern part of the Fenlands, so far as this has been determinable by study of the lateral continuity of peat and other beds, by observations on the remains of organisms in them, and by correlation with archaeological indices (Godwin and Clifford 1938). In these papers comparatively little reference has been made to the results of pollen analysis, and it is with the application of this method to studies of Fenland deposits that the present paper is concerned. It purposes to add another type of evidence for the correlation of fen beds, and to show that this evidence both confirms and extends the results previously described.