Synthesis of Holocene glacial landscapes in Europe

This chapter reviews previous studies that have been carried out on the synthesis of European glaciated landscapes during the Holocene. Although these studies are scarce, they are useful to understand the context and state of the art. The analysis reveals three distinct periods of research activity, the first one that covered the 18th, 19th, and first part of the 20th centuries during which the chronology of glacial landforms was based on relative dating, followed by the development of 14C dating of organic material and finally the last phase related to the generalisation of direct dating of glacial landforms using cosmogenic nuclides including in situ 10Be, 36Cl, and 14C. Our understanding of glacier changes during the Holocene is still unevenly distributed. Glacier evolution is relatively well studied in regions where the cryosphere still represents a large area, while it remains poorly constrained in other regions such as the Pyrenees or Mediterranean mountain ranges.