Quaternary Science Reviews xxx (2011) 1e10
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Quaternary Science Reviews
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Youngest Toba Tuff in the Son Valley, India: a weak and discontinuous
stratigraphic marker
E. Gatti a, *, A.J. Durant b, c, d, P.L. Gibbard a, C. Oppenheimer a, e, f
a
Department of Geography, University of Cambridge, Downing Place, CB2 3EN, Cambridge, UK
Centre for Atmospheric Science, Department of Chemistry, University of Cambridge, Lensfield Road, Cambridge, CB2 1EW, UK
c
Norwegian Institute for Air Research, P.O. Box 100, NO-2027 Kjeller, Norway
d
Geological and Mining Engineering and Sciences, Michigan Technological University, USA
e
Le Studium, Institute for Advanced Studies, Orléans and Tours, France
f
L’Institut des Sciences de la Terre d’Orléans, l’Université d’Orléans, 1a rue de la Férollerie, 45071 Orléans, cedex 2, France
b
a r t i c l e i n f o
a b s t r a c t
Article history:
Received 4 May 2011
Received in revised form
20 October 2011
Accepted 22 October 2011
Available online xxx
Investigation of the climatic and environmental impacts of the Youngest Toba Tuff (YTT, w74 ka BP)
eruption of Toba volcano, Sumatra, is crucial for understanding the consequences of the eruption for
contemporaneous human populations. The Middle Son Valley, in India, was the first locality on the Indian
subcontinent where the YTT was reported. The ash bed forms a discontinuous layer stretching for over
30 km along the river. Here we report on the stratigraphic contexts of YTT ash layers in alluvial deposits
of the Middle Son Valley, in order to reconstruct the taphonomy of the ash deposits and the dynamic of
their deposition. Although the distal ash has been studied since the 1980s, its stratigraphic integrity and
the mechanisms and pathways involved in its transport and deposition have bit previously been
assessed. We find that the YTT occurrences in the Middle Son Valley may not be reliable chronostratigraphical markers for millennial scale palaeoenvironmental reconstruction.
Ó 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Keywords:
Toba
Son Valley
Tephra
Fluvial geomorphology
1. Introduction
The first reported finds of Youngest Toba Tuff (YTT) deposits in
India were made in the Middle Son Valley (Madhya Pradesh, North
Central India; Williams and Royce, 1982). Initially these sites were
investigated for their abundance of Middle Palaeolithic archaeological assemblages (Acharyya and Basu, 1993), but since the 1980s
they have become the focus of palaeoenvironmental studies concerned with understanding the immediate and longer term impacts
of the YTT super-eruption on climate and human occupation (Basu
et al., 1987).
The w74 ka YTT super-eruption of the Toba volcano in northern
Sumatra (Fig. 1) is the largest eruption known for the Quaternary
(Chesner and Rose, 1991). The total mass of rhyolitic magma ejected
has been estimated crudely as 7 1015 kg (or 2800 km3 dense rock
equivalent, DRE) (Rose and Chesner, 1990; Chesner and Rose, 1991;
Chesner et al., 1991). This deposit includes w1000 km3 (DRE) of coignimbrite tephra fallout, which covered w2 107 km2 of southern
and southeast Asia. The tephra deposits are preserved in alluvial
settings across India and peninsular Malaysia (e.g. Ninkovich et al.,
* Corresponding author. Tel.: þ44 7898270930.
E-mail address: eg322@cam.ac.uk (E. Gatti).
1978a; Ninkovich et al., 1978b; Westgate et al., 1998), and in deepsea tephra layers in the Indian Ocean, the Bay of Bengal and South
China Sea (Ninkovich, 1979; Pattan et al., 1999; Gasparotto et al.,
2000; Song et al., 2000; Schulz et al., 2002).
The YTT eruption must also have injected substantial quantities
of sulphur into the middle atmosphere argued in early works to
have induced a ‘volcanic winter’ (Rampino and Self, 1992). Later
studies suggested the climate forcing due to the volcanic aerosol
veil might have accelerated the onset of stadial conditions during
the 1000 year-interval between Dansgaard-Oeschger events 19
(70e68 ka) and 20 (75e71 ka) (Zielinski et al., 1996) though there is
no strong evidence to substantiate this hypothesis. Proponents of
extreme change scenarios have concluded that ecosystems and
hominid populations were devastated as a result (Ambrose, 1998).
However, others have cautioned against assuming extreme global
climate impacts given the limited constraints on the sulphur yield
of the eruption and on the date of any palaeodemographic
‘bottleneck’ in anatomically modern human populations
(Oppenheimer, 2002), as well as a lack of evidence for population
crashes in contemporary fauna (Ambrose, 2003; Gathorne-Hardy
and Harcourt-Smith, 2003).
To improve understanding of the extent and severity of environmental impacts of the YTT eruption it is critical to determine
how long it took for the ash to be redeposit and consolidated in the
0277-3791/$ e see front matter Ó 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.quascirev.2011.10.008
Please cite this article in press as: Gatti, E., et al., Youngest Toba Tuff in the Son Valley, India: a weak and discontinuous stratigraphic marker,
Quaternary Science Reviews (2011), doi:10.1016/j.quascirev.2011.10.008
E. Gatti et al. / Quaternary Science Reviews xxx (2011) 1e10
2
Fig. 1. Map showing the distribution of terrestrial and marine sites in which the YTT ash-fall has been identified. YTT deposits have been found in deep-sea sediments from the
Indian Ocean, Bay of Bengal, Central Indian Ocean Basin, Arabian Sea and South China Sea; terrestrial sites are found in India, Bangladesh and Malaysia (data from Oppenheimer,
2002; Ninkovich et al., 1978a, b; Acharyya and Basu, 1993; Pattan et al., 1999; Song et al., 2000; Gasparotto et al., 2000). Red dot indicates the location of Toba; green dot indicates
the Son Valley.(For interpretation of the references to colour in this figure legend, the reader is referred to the web version of this article.)
receiving landscape; the longer the ash remained mobile in the
environment, the more chronic the impact on vegetation and
associated ecosystems would have been (Jones, 2010). Tephra
successions, if suitably preserved, provide chronostratigraphical
markers within sedimentary sequence (Sarna-Wojcicki and Davis,
1991). Hydrological systems may also be inundated with sediment following ash fallout which results in rapid accumulation
rates and preservation of indicators of sudden remobilisation and
re-deposition of unconsolidated pyroclastic material (Hayes et al.,
2002; Manville et al., 2005; Kataoka et al., 2009).
The YTT stratum in the Middle Son Valley has been repeatedly
used as a marker in geo-archaeological investigations of sediment
sequences (Williams and Royce, 1982; Jones and Pal, 2005).
However, its reliability as a stratigraphical marker has until now not
been considered. In this paper, we contextualise the distal YTT
stratum of the Middle Son Valley through study of the stratigraphy
of the volcaniclastic sequences, and we provide textural and
structural details about the ash units. We present a series of
stratigraphic sections containing YTT tephra located within the
modern riverside cliffs. Specifically, we describe the tephra sites
between the Rehi River and the site of Khunteli (Fig. 2).
We provide an interpretation of the river activity before and
after the eruption, revealing the characteristics of the ash preserved
in selected environmental niches. This is the first sedimentological
and geomorphological study of the YTT deposits in the Middle Son
Valley. The model, together with the field evidence, suggests that
the YTT deposits of the Son Valley area do not provide a reliable
chronostratigraphical marker in the region for long-term palaeoenvironmental reconstructions and archaeological correlations,
except for the site of Ghoghara.
2. Study area
The Middle Son Valley is located 100 km south from Allahabad
and 130 km southwest of Varanasi, in north central India (24 70 N
80 /83 500 E, Fig. 2). The regional climate is sub-tropical,
characterised by hot humid summers (AprileSeptember,
temperatures > 40 C), and cooler winters (OctobereMarch) with
low precipitation. Affected by the summer monsoon from June to
September, the topography and geomorphology of the hills and
valleys reflect the intense summer runoff, which has deeply incised
the river terraces.
The Son (784 km long) is one of the longest rivers of India and
the longest of the southern tributaries feeding into the River
Ganges. It flows, as does the Narmada River, along the line of
a major E-W tectonic lineament, the Narmada fault (Williams and
Royce, 1982). Originating in Madhya Pradesh, just east of the Narmada River, the Son flows north-northwest and cuts through
Middle Proterozoic limestone and shale of the Vindhyan SuperGroup (Singh, 1980) and Middle-Pleistocene and Holocene alluvial plains, before turning eastwards to encounter Middle Proterozoic sandstones of the Kaimur Range (Morad et al., 1991). The
modern channel has incised the metamorphic bedrock to a depth of
about 30e35 m, forming deposits of fluvial sand (Williams and
Royce, 1982). Throughout its history, the passage of the Son river
has been strongly influenced by climatic factors (reflected in
changes in its floodplain deposition and channel down cutting),
since the river is constrained laterally as a consequence of its
geological setting (Sharma and Clark, 1982).
The area of study includes the river-cut cliffs in the alluvial zone
between the confluence of the Rehi and Son rivers and Khunteli (or
Khuteli) (Fig. 2). The reported YTT deposits (Acharyya and Basu,
1993; Jones and Pal, 2005) comprise a discontinuous tephra bed
covering an area of w90 km2. Between Rehi and Ghoghara (first
described by Williams and Royce in 1982), lateral variations within
the ash deposits are minimal, and the ash layer appears repeatedly
at a height between 4 and 6 m above the present river bed (Fig. 3).
The Son River alluvial basin includes terraced surfaces flanked
by floodplains, point-bar and alluvial fan deposits. The main river
channel is bounded by a series of Middle and Late-Pleistocene and
Early-Holocene sedimentary terraces that reach altitudes of as
much as 30 m, and deeply-incised seasonal channels known as
Please cite this article in press as: Gatti, E., et al., Youngest Toba Tuff in the Son Valley, India: a weak and discontinuous stratigraphic marker,
Quaternary Science Reviews (2011), doi:10.1016/j.quascirev.2011.10.008
E. Gatti et al. / Quaternary Science Reviews xxx (2011) 1e10
3
Fig. 2. Location of the tephra sites in the Son valley. Red and yellow dots on the map represent the logged sites presented in this work. DEM from ASTER GDEM (ASTER GDEM is
a product of METI and NASA).(For interpretation of the references to colour in this figure legend, the reader is referred to the web version of this article.)
‘nalas’. The terrace, incised by the modern Son River, has been
intensively studied due to the presence of the YTT marker and the
coincidence of archaeological sites, where Middle Palaeolithic and
Neolithic artefacts have been found (Sharma and Clark, 1982;
Williams and Royce, 1982, 1983; Jones and Pal, 2005; Jones and
Pal, 2009; Haslam et al., 2010).
Four formations have been historically ascribed to the alluvial
deposits of the Son Valley. In chronological order they are: Sihawal
Formation, Patpara Formation, Baghor Formation and Khetaunhi
Formation (Williams and Royce, 1982, 1983; Williams and Clarke,
1995; Williams et al., 2006). The geological context of the incised
terrace is unclear, mainly due to the absence of absolute dates and
robust stratigraphic correlation (Jones and Pal, 2009).
Several models have been proposed for the geomorphological
evolution of the alluvial plain of the Middle Son Valley through the
period Early Pleistocene to Late Holocene (Williams and Royce,
1982, 1983; Williams and Clarke, 1995; Williams et al., 2006).
These authors analysed the large-scale evolution of the river based
on differences between the four formations and distinct climatic
regimes. A stratigraphical model (at 1 km scale) of the emplacement of all the four formations within the river basin was also
proposed by Williams and Clarke (1995) and modified by Williams
et al. (2006).
the stratigraphy. Modern topography was characterised using
a Total Station (Zeiss Elta R55 EDM). The 600 points grid obtained
was interpolated using the programmes Surfer 3.0 and ArcMap
(Fig. 3) providing a further means of investigating the distribution
of tephra.
We describe here six tephra type- sections, out of the nine
discovered and surveyed during the 2009 field work (Table 1). Two
of these sites, GG1 and KH, have been previously described in the
literature (Williams and Royce, 1982; Jones and Pal, 2005, 2009;
Williams et al., 2006; Jones, 2010). The six sites were selected on
the basis of their ash characteristics (Par. 2.1.), sedimentological
structures and spatial distribution.
In order to isolate the depositional environments in which the
tephra were identified, the sediments have been assigned facies
and floodplain associations using the codes proposed by Miall
(1996) and Nanson and Croke (1992), respectively. We identified
the major facies assemblages and the depositional settings prevailing at the time of the ash deposition. This leads us to propose
a geomorphological model for the dynamic activity of the river
through the critical period of interest.
3. Methodology and site selection
For this work, we selected sites representing primary and/or
reworked ash, and considered textural, sedimentological and
stratigraphic characteristics of the ash and its associated sediments.
Primary (non-reworked) ash-fall is characterised by its: i) colourist
whiteness (Munsell code 7.5 YR or 10 YR 8/1 or 8/2); ii) thickness
ranging 4e5 cm; iii) sharp lower contact with siliciclastic sediments; iv) homogeneous texture. Secondary (reworked) ash
deposits are characterised by: i) post-deposition structures (cross-
For this work we aimed to assess the validity of the tephra as
stratigraphic marker. In an attempt to correlate the tephra layer
across sections we surveyed a 30 km length along the river banks,
logged and sampled specific sites. Serial photographs of cliff
sections were taken from boat and bank traverses, and photomosaics were constructed to aid contextualisation of the YTT layer in
3.1. Criteria for discriminating primary ash fallout and reworked
tephra deposits
Please cite this article in press as: Gatti, E., et al., Youngest Toba Tuff in the Son Valley, India: a weak and discontinuous stratigraphic marker,
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E. Gatti et al. / Quaternary Science Reviews xxx (2011) 1e10
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Fig. 3. Sites and position of YTT ash in the Ghoghara-Rehi cliffs. The topographic profile was derived from a survey carried out with a Zeiss Elta R55 EDM total station. The
photomosaics show the morphology of the riverside cliffs and the position of the ash site RH1.
bedding, root casts, bioturbation); ii) discontinuous/mixed contacts
with units above/below; iii) geomorphological features indicating
displaced facies (including, blocks of ash within older sediments,
traces of slumping, etc.).
4. Tephrostratigraphy
Six sections exposing volcaniclastic deposits were logged and
their sedimentological structures described in terms of facies. The
resulting logs reveal seven different facies (Table 2).
4.1. Primary and secondary ash sites
This section deals with units that include both primary and
secondary ash. The sites are located within an area between the
Rehi-Son confluence and the cliff on the northern bank of the Son,
in the vicinity of the Ghoghara temple (Fig. 2).
Excavations demonstrated that the sites in which primary ash was
identified all present a similar stratigraphic context (Fig. 4). The
sections include 2e8 m of cross-bedded brownish medium sand
(Facies Scp) and a 5 cm clay layer (Facies Cl) at the base of the sections
Table 1
List of the sites investigated during the 2009 field campaign. Sites evidenced in grey are the type-sections used to determine the facies and represented in the logs in Fig. 7.
Previously
described
Thickness of the
primary ash (cm)
Thickness of
the secondary
ash (m)
Selection criteria
5
5
1.6
1.5
Western site
Main ash site, firstly
discovered
82 10 2.9900 E
NO
Williams
and Royce,
1982
NO
2e5
1.05
Sedimentological structures
24 300 1000 N
82 10 800 E
NO
0.90
/
Ghogara cliffs
Ghogara cliffs
Ghogara cliffs
24 30 8 N
24 300 700 N
24 300 1400 N
82 1 9 E
82 10 1100 E
82 10 20.6”E
NO
NO
NO
1.4
2.28
w1
/
Eastern site
/
Rehi confluence
Khunteli
24 30’600 N
24 320 2800 N
82 00 5500 E
82 160 3300 E
NO
Acharyya
and Basu,
1993
0.1 (disturbed
lenses only)
0.45 (disturbed)
0.1e0.4
disturbed
lenses only
/
/
1.3
2.2
Western secondary only site
Situated on the right side
of the river
Type
Site
Locality
Coordinates
Primary D
Secondary ASH
RH1
GG1
Rehi
Ghogara cliffs
(Main Site)
24 300 900 N
24 300 700 N
82 00 5600 E
82 10 200 E
GG1.b
24 300 7.500 N
GG2
Ghogara cliffs
(gully)
Ghogara cliffs
GG3
GG4
GG5
RH2
KH
Secondary ASH only
0 00
0
00
Please cite this article in press as: Gatti, E., et al., Youngest Toba Tuff in the Son Valley, India: a weak and discontinuous stratigraphic marker,
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Table 2
Lithofacies codes and description, association and interpretation (after Miall, 1996).
Lithofacies
Code
Colour
Description
Architectural
Element
Stratigraphic
position
Type-section
Palaeosol
P
7.5 YR 7/4
Distal/abandoned
Above ash
Everywhere
Micaceous massive silty
sand with calcretes
Smc
10 YR 6/6
Above ash
Everywhere
Secondary ash
SA
10 YR 8/2, 7/3, 7/4
Above ash
Everywhere
Primary ash
PA
10 YR 8/1
Ash
Coarse Clay with roots/
calcretes/sand
Massive coarse clay with
mudcracks
Laminated fine clay
Csc
10 YR 4/3
Below ash
RH1, GG1.a, GG1.b,
GG4
RH2
Cm
10 YR 4/3
Pedogenetically altered, oxidised
sediment enriched in calcretes and roots
Massive unit of heterogeneous sand
mixed with micas and silt. Calcrete
nodules and roots.
Volcaniclastic silt, mixed with sand;
usually finely laminated, coarsening
upward
Very fine ash, compact and without
fluvial structures
Massive clay mixed with sand or silt,
enriched in calcrete nodules and roots.
Massive clay
Below ash
RH2
Cl
10 YR 7/4, 5/4
Below ash
Cross-bedded pebbly sand
Scp
7.5 YR 6/4
10YR 6/3,6/6
RH1, GG1, GG1.b,
GG4, KH
RH1, GG1, GG1.b,
GG4, KH
Clay mixed with sand, presenting fine
horizontal lamination
Poorly sorted planar cross-bedded
medium to find sand; horizontal
laminations, imbricated pebbles, shales grains
and 1e3 m of micaceous coarse silt (Facies Smc) enriched in calcrete
on the top of the sequence, capped with soil (Facies P) (Fig. 4). The ash
horizon can be distinguished within all the studied sections, but only
three provide important tephrostratigraphic markers: section RH1,
GG1 and GG4. These horizons consist of a 2e8 cm thick stratum of
primary ash (Facies PA) always in sharp contact with the underlying
clay, and 1e2 m thick unit of reworked ash (Facies SA), gradationally
overlying Facies PA. The primary ash is characterised by powdery,
finer grains and whiteness (10YR or 7.5 YR 8/1 and 8/2). The secondary
ash is texturally coarser, darker (10 YR 8/3 or 7/1), and appears in
massive beds with no apparent depositional structures. The ash
sequence gradually coarsens upwards and the contact between the
secondary ash and the siliciclastic silt is indistinguishable.
4.2. Sites showing only reworked ash
The two sequences with reworked ash show only particular
stratigraphic characteristics.
RH2 section (Fig. 5a) is composed of dark brown carbonate
cemented clay (Facies Cm); lenses of gravel, in which an admixture
of fine sand is also observed within the clay, the latter becoming
coarser and carbonate-rich towards the top (Facies Csc and P). The
reworked ash (w1.3 m thick) is intermixed with the same micaceous silt that overlies the other sequences (Facies Smc). The
Munsell colour of the secondary ash of RH2 is 7.5YR 7/4 (pink).
Compared to the primary and secondary sequence, it appears RH2
has only the final part of the volcaniclastic reworked units. Again no
sedimentary structures are recognized within the ash unit.
KH (Fig. 5b) is stratigraphically similar to section GG1, as it
exposes the same cross-bedded sand seen at the base of the section
(w8 m thick). The cross-bedded sand alternates with fine bands of
clayey silt, 2e3 cm thick: 11 m above the river bed, the crossbedded medium sand unit is capped by a fine stratified sand unit
and a thick carbonated band. A thin ash layer overlies the latter, 1cm thick and mixed with clay. The secondary ash unit of KH appears
sedimentologically similar to a 2-m lens of volcaniclastic material
mixed with clay and laminated sand. The unit is yellowish brown
(10 YR 5/4). Although fine laminations appear within the lower
sand units and the clay, their origin is uncertain.
4.3. Tephra sedimentological structures and geometry
Much of the tephra deposits in the Son Valley present no
evidence of sedimentological structures in the upper reworked
Overbank
Lateral accretion
Below ash, near the
present channel bed
tephra layers. The exception is site GG1.b, located in a gully
nearby the Ghoghara main section. The site (Fig. 6) presents
w8 cm basal ash, revealing a “primary” ash layer that itself may
be subdivided into the lowermost ash (ash 1), in direct contact
with the clay unit; it is 1.5 cm thick, white (7.5YR 8/1), powdery;
on the top, divided by a sharp darker contact, 2.5 cm of darker ash
(ash 2), 7.5YR 8/2, pinkish white; on the top of ash 2, w8 cm from
the bottom, a 1 cm thick lens of darker ash, including medium
sand grains impurities, is evidenced (ash 3). On the top of ash 3,
w3 cm of white (5YR 8/1) powdery ash (ash 4), visually very
similar to ash 2. Ash 4 is overlain by a heavily bioturbated
palaeosurface, ca. 1 mm thick. The palaeosurface is in sharp
contact with a 1.5 m thick sequence of reworked ash deposits. The
unit is characterised by several sedimentary structures (Fig. 6):
w1e2 mm thick ripple-like laminations, grouped in cm-thick
bands, repeated cyclically every 10 cm; lightedark wavy bands,
1e3 mm thick, and thicker parallel bands. The volcaniclastic
component gradually decreases towards the top of the sequence.
No traces of post-depositional disturbance (i.e. slumped blocks,
roots, rhyzoliths, carbonate nodules), are found within the ash
sequence.
5. Discussion
Although the ash of sites GG1 and KH have been explored since
the 1980s to elucidate the Quaternary geology and prehistoric
environment in the Son Valley, examination of the taphonomy of
the ash units has been minimal (Jones and Pal, 2009; Williams et al.,
2006 and 2009). To date, the ash of GG1 was described as “well
preserved” and “80 cm relatively pure” (Jones and Pal, 2005),
“compact” (Jones, 2010), “discontinuous bed of pure volcanic ash
up to 1.5 m thick” (Williams et al., 2006), “laterally discontinuous
unit of volcanic ash up to 4 m thick” (Williams and Royce, 1983).
The reworked ash received less attention, being described only by
Williams et al. (2009) as “completely cemented with carbonate
from 3.45 to 3.83 cm above the base of the ash” in the Ghoghara
section and “The upper 70 cm of the ash is reworked” in Khunteli
(Williams et al., 2009).
We will discuss the stratigraphical characteristics of YTT sites
contextualised in their depositional environment, demonstrating
how ash facies associations can unravelled the dynamics of a river
depositing, redepositing and preserving the tephra. These features
should be considered carefully since using a tephra layer as chronostratigraphical marker.
Please cite this article in press as: Gatti, E., et al., Youngest Toba Tuff in the Son Valley, India: a weak and discontinuous stratigraphic marker,
Quaternary Science Reviews (2011), doi:10.1016/j.quascirev.2011.10.008
6
E. Gatti et al. / Quaternary Science Reviews xxx (2011) 1e10
Fig. 4. The principal ash sites of the Rehi-Ghoghara location: A) GG1; B) GG4 and C) RH1.
5.1. The local environment pre- and post-deposition of the YTT in
the middle Son Valley
The lithofacies assemblages identified represent specific styles
and sub-environments of deposition within the catchment. Fig. 7
illustrates the stratigraphical units of the six type-sections, the
corresponding facies and their lithofacies association.
The sedimentary structures within this facies (cross-lamination,
imbrication, poor sorting) indicate that the sand was deposited on
a point-bar or counterpoint-bar (cfr. Miall, 1996). The medium
grain-size, cross-bedded sand observed at all the sites at the base of
the succession (except RH2 and GG1.b), suggests proximity to the
active channel. These characteristics indicate a large-scale depositional environment of lateral accretion from the main river channel.
The river eroded on one side of the channel and deposited its finer
sediments on the other side, creating point-bars and shallow-water
deposits. Facies Cl is suggestive of a distal, shallow-water, lowenergy environment. This is consistent with the presence of very
fine, powdery volcanic ash on the top of this clay. Both Facies PA and
SA also suggest a low energy aqueous environment, favourable for
preservation of the deposits. The facies association characteristics
suggest an overbank environment, established prior to ash deposition. Facies Smc and P are characterised by coarser silt, and
pervasive pedogenic features and carbonate nodules. The presence
of carbonate nodules and roots clearly indicates a cessation of
fluvial activity, and the facies association may represent an abandoned terrace surface, or distal deposits that the river was unable to
reach even during floods events.
Please cite this article in press as: Gatti, E., et al., Youngest Toba Tuff in the Son Valley, India: a weak and discontinuous stratigraphic marker,
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Fig. 5. Sites containing secondary ash only. A) RH2, nearby the primary ash site of RH1 and B) Khunteli (KH), 30 km downstream from Ghoghara, on the Son’s south bank. The
tephra layer is only visible at the top end of the sections, and is substantially reworked to incorporate sand and silt-sized fluvial sediment.
These multi-facies associations indicate a fluvial floodplain
setting consisting of ephemeral ponds and oxbow lakes isolated
from the main channel through point-bars and floodplain surfaces,
where the ash could be preserved. This is in accordance with
microanalyses of the tephra units of Ghoghara and Khunteli by
Jones (2010), which highlighted a sensible difference between the
particle size distribution of the primary ash (w60 mm) and the
upper secondary ash layer (>125 mm), thus suggesting the primary
ash deposited into an aqueous environment.
Fig. 8 shows the lateral accretion and deposition on the pointbar of coarse sediments (gravel-size), the deposition of medium
sediments in the near-channel overbank environment (medium
and fine sand-size), and accumulation of fine sediments in the
distal overbank areas (silt and clay).
As a result of its lateral accretion-aggradation style in this area,
the river deposits its sediments laterally and not vertically (Fig. 8a,
note the arrow indicating the preferential aggradation direction). In
such a setting, following the eruption, primary ash would have
been preserved only in protected low-energy niches that were
rapidly buried by later sediments. The remaining ash, especially if
left exposed at the surface, would have been rapidly eroded to be
re-deposited downstream or in lateral channels. The progression
Fig. 6. Primary ash layer and reworked sequence in GG1.b.
Please cite this article in press as: Gatti, E., et al., Youngest Toba Tuff in the Son Valley, India: a weak and discontinuous stratigraphic marker,
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Fig. 7. Tephra type-sections logs. The facies association between Rehi and Khunteli offers an insight into the morphology and activity of the river around 74 ka ago. The YTT
sequence around this area is remarkably similar, suggesting the requirement of particular environmental niches for the preservation of the primary volcanic ash fallout horizon.
from lateral accretion to overbank to abandoned terrace environments apparent in the Ghoghara section suggests a gradual shift in
the river morphology. This change in depositional style is reflected
in changes in grain size of the deposits (from medium sand to silt)
that are typical of fining-upward fluvial sequences: the river fills
the channel and its active bed laterally shifted further south.
5.2. YTT deposits in the middle Son Valley as
a chronostratigraphical marker?
Several attempts have been made to place the YTT within the
broader alluvial stratigraphy of the Son Valley, in order to reconcile
the history of the alluvial plain with the archaeological artefacts.
After reviewing the literature, the exact stratigraphic position of
the YTT bed in relation to the Quaternary Formations is unclear. The
YTT has been placed within the Baghor Coarse Member (Williams
and Royce, 1982; Basu et al. 1987; Acharyya and Basu, 1993),
beneath the Baghor Coarse Member (Williams and Clarke, 1995), at
the junction between the Patpara Formation and in the Baghor
Coarse Member (Jones and Pal, 2005; Jones, 2010). More recently it
has been proposed that the tephra lies between a newly described
Khunteli Formation, dated to 73 ka, and the Patpara Formation, with
an age of 56 ka assigned to the latter (Williams et al., 2006).
Here we suggest that these inconsistencies are related to the
assumption that the tephra always occurs in its correct stratigraphical position and the lack of dates in direct association with
the tephra sediments. Furthermore, the geomorphological model
indicates that river aggradation has tended to create a lateral
discontinuity that disturbs the vertical accumulation, therefore
assigning the ash to a specific vertical unit could be misleading.
5.3. Reliability of the YTT as palaeoenvironmental marker
A more recent study (Williams et al., 2009) also focused on the
Rehi and Khunteli sections, in an attempt to gain insights into the
environmental impacts of the YTT eruption. In this work, carbon
and oxygen isotopic ratios were measured in calcareous nodules
and root casts found below, within and above the ash taken from
the GG1 and KH sites. The results suggested replacement of C3
forest that had thrived prior to the YTT fallout by C4-dominated
grasslands or wooded grasslands. They concluded that the YTT
eruption led to these changes. Similarly Jones (2010) considered the
silt-dominated facies overlying the ash a sign of abrupt climatic
change immediately after the eruption.
While we are aware that the time-frame and pace of aggradation
of the post-tephra units, together with the time of restabilisation of
the system, cannot be constrained using stratigraphy only, we also
note that there are no evidences that the units above the ash have
been deposited immediately after the eruption. The model proposed
here implies that the river deposits at Ghoghara and Khunteli were
exposed to erosion and reworking, such that the stratigraphy of the
ash deposits could result from incision, lateral erosion and redeposition on a timescale of weeks to decades to centuries to millennia.
The silt-dominated facies overlying the ash is widespread on the top
of all the Middle, Late-Pleistocene and Early Holocene terraces. The
post-Toba silt could indicate either that the dynamics of the river
channel changed substantially following the eruption (suggesting
a strong post-Toba environmental and climatic effect), or that the
coarse/medium sand above the ash layer is no longer preserved. The
latter could indicate instead a migrating channel and change in
facies, suggesting a major geomorphological control on the river
rather than eruption-related climatic changes.
The major issue in tackling the palaeoenvironmental impact of
the Toba super-eruption is that existing methods of palaeoenvironmental reconstructions lack the analytical precision
needed to answer this timescale issue (Williams, in press), and the
sedimentation rate in fluvial environments lacks the temporal
resolution needed to address questions regarding climate change
after the YTT eruption. We consider that the Ghoghara site GG1.b,
which fine stratification indicates slow sedimentation conditions,
the one locality suitable for chronology-critical work.
5.4. Reliability of the YTT as an archaeological marker
Archaeological studies (Jones and Pal, 2005, 2009; Jones, 2007)
attempted to establish an associations between the ash and the
Please cite this article in press as: Gatti, E., et al., Youngest Toba Tuff in the Son Valley, India: a weak and discontinuous stratigraphic marker,
Quaternary Science Reviews (2011), doi:10.1016/j.quascirev.2011.10.008
E. Gatti et al. / Quaternary Science Reviews xxx (2011) 1e10
9
Fig. 8. A) Generalised macroscale model of a point-bar-channel in a low-to-medium sinuosity river; the main active channel is shown on the right; lateral accretion deposits are
shown on the flanks of the point-bar; overbank deposits fill a shallow-lake at left of the point-bar, in the floodplain; the green arrow indicates the lateral aggradation of the river; B)
hypothetical river geomorphology at the moment of the ash-fallout; C) late-stage evolution of the ash taphonomy, with the ash incorporated in a fluvial system reaching a new
equilibrium. c ¼ coarse fluvial sediments; m ¼ medium fluvial sediments; f ¼ fine fluvial sediments; Cases i, ii and iii indicate three possible scenarios. Case i) is the case of distal
floodplain, with the ash deposited in a very low-energy environment, where the water can reach the ash only during seasonal floods, bringing only the finer sediments. In this case
primary ash is preserved beneath gradually accumulation of fine reworked ash. Case ii) represents the case of ash preserved in a relatively protected location, but exposed to
reworking. In this case the primary ash might have been preserved in its original context, but the upper contact might have been partially eroded and redeposited after. Case iii)
represents the ash exposed in a secondary-deposition site. Ash reached the site from upstream, subsequent to the river action. In this case the YTT will show strong signs of
reworking and will not be preserved as primary deposit.(For interpretation of the references to colour in this figure legend, the reader is referred to the web version of this article.)
Palaeolithic artefacts in the Middle Son Valley. Using artefacts in
secondary contexts Jones and Pal (2009) observed a change in lithic
technology and proposed a shift in hominids behaviour during the
Upper Pleistocene, suggesting that the Toba eruption may have
further contributed to behavioural changes.
We note artefacts have not been recovered from stratigraphic
units that show clear evidence of YTT primary ash and the time at
which evidence for human populations reappeared may be of the
order of millennia (based on the uncertainty of the dating methodologies previously employed, see Jones and Pal, 2009). We have
demonstrated the evidence for reworking at many of the Middle
Son Valley sites, suggesting that the chronological relationship
between the artefacts and the YTT strata in the Son Valley is
insufficient to allow a robust connection between the eruption and
its human impact. The palaeogeomorphology of the area suggests
that new archaeological sites in association with primary YTT
horizons might be found closer to the interior of the fluvial plain,
towards the Rehi River.
6. Conclusions
The lithofacies associations revealed from the Rehi-GhogharaKhunteli sites indicate an environment conducive to the preservation of primary ash fallout. Nevertheless, the YTT was preserved
only in selected geomorphic environments that offered protection
to the unconsolidated volcanic particles. This environment was
a low energy, shallow-water depression. Before the YTT fallout, the
Son River had adopted the characteristics of a sand-dominated,
medium-sinuosity and low-gradient river, with laterally stable
single channel, seasonal floods, floodplains and point-bars. The
fining-upwards sequence (reflected in the shift from lateral accretion to overbank and distal channel) could represent the gradual
filling of the river bed due to meander migration.
The stratigraphic context of ash deposits in the Middle Son
Valley is rarely of the quality required to provide a well-defined
chronostratigraphic marker horizon. The ash units are challenging to distinguish from the overlying silts and often show
abundant evidence of reworking; the upper boundary is gradational and the reworked units may be several metres thick
compared to an initial thickness of 4e5 cm. Most importantly the
lower boundary of the ash layer needs to be sharp and undisturbed
to provide a clear marker; it was rare to find this condition intact:
out of 30 km of river bank surveyed (on either side of the river) we
found only one localised occurrence where the ash could be
considered “primary” in context, and neither of the ash locations
corresponded to collocation of archaeological artefact assemblages.
It is therefore critical that any future sampling for dating and
palaeoenvironmental reconstructions should take full account of
the sedimentation style and morphology of the river and the
associated evolution of the local landscape through the period.
Please cite this article in press as: Gatti, E., et al., Youngest Toba Tuff in the Son Valley, India: a weak and discontinuous stratigraphic marker,
Quaternary Science Reviews (2011), doi:10.1016/j.quascirev.2011.10.008
10
E. Gatti et al. / Quaternary Science Reviews xxx (2011) 1e10
Acknowledgments
E.G. thanks the Dudley Stamp Memorial Award, the CambridgeIndia Partnership, the SMUTS Memorial Fund and the Philip Lake
Fund (Department of Geography, University of Cambridge) for
the fieldwork grants. Additional support was provided by the Leverhulme Trust. Jinu Koshy, Janardhana Bora and Hardindra Prasad
Ram provided invaluable assistance in the field. We also acknowledge the kindness and hospitality we received in several villages in
the Son Valley. We thank J.N. Pal, R. Korisettar, M. Petraglia and
M. Haslam for their support of fieldwork in India in 2009, and
C. Shipton, C. Clarkson, J. Blinkhorn and S. Jones for discussions on
the archaeology of the Son Valley. We thank S. Boreham and C. Rolfe
for assistance with the facilities of the Geography Science Laboratories at the Department of Geography, University of Cambridge.
Thoughtful reviews from Prof. Williams and Dr. May were greatly
appreciated and improved the quality of the manuscript.
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