Abstract:

An integrated high resolution multi-proxy study (i.e. pollen, NPP, micro and macro-charcoal, sedimentology and geochemistry) and arqchaeological reserch program has been carried out in the high mountain Madriu-Perafita-Claror valley, Andorra, Eastern Pyrenees. This study aims to understand the long-term shaping of this high mountain cultural landscape, included in the UNESCO World Heritage List. Results obtained underline the marked complexity of high mountain land-use system over the Holocene period and stress the existence in the MPCV of different phases of microregional land-use and landscape variability since the Mesolithic period. This long-term high mountain land-use is superimposed on a climatic variability revealed through the organic matter content of the lake.