Holstein interglacial

The Holstein or Holsteinian interglacial (German: Holstein-Warmzeit or Holstein-Interglazial), also called the Mindel-Riss interglacial (Mindel-Riß-Interglazial) in the Alpine region, was the third to last major interglacial period in Europe before today’s warm time, called the Holocene. An interglacial is a time when ice ages warm up and glaciers shrink, allowing plants, animals, and people to live in areas that were previously covered in ice.

This warm period came right after the Elster glaciation and before the Saale glaciation, during a time known as the Middle Pleistocene. Scientists have studied this period carefully to understand Earth’s climate history. For a long time, they were not sure exactly when it happened, as it seemed to match two different times in Earth’s past based on sea level changes, called marine isotope stages MIS 11 and MIS 9.

Recent research suggests that the Holstein interglacial happened around 421 to 395,000 years ago, matching marine isotope stage MIS 11. This information helps us learn how Earth’s climate has changed over hundreds of thousands of years and gives clues about how it might change in the future.

Definition

The Holstein interglacial is a warm period that happened long ago. Scientists can see this time in special layers of dirt and sand. At a place near Hamburg, they found clues showing how the land changed from cold ice ages to warmer weather and then back again.