Detailed stratigraphic and sedimentologic work combined with high-resolution radiocarbon dating in an exposure of an upto 12 m thick Holocene succession near the town of Veurne in West Belgium has shown that filling of the coastal plain at continuous, but decelerating sea-level rise, occurs less smoothly than is usually assumed. Three tidal sequences are distinguished, separated by peat layers, the second peat and the surface peat, respectively. The second peat developed at about 6800 cal BP, after the rate of sea-level rise dropped from 7 m/ka to about 2.5 m/ka, indicating that sediment supply outran relative sea-level rise. In the excavation, the second peat drowns about 100 yr after it started and is covered by a thin veneer of inter- and supratidal beds, after which low intertidal to subtidal conditions prevailed for more than 1000 pr with no deposition. These 1000 yr stand for a gap of about 2 m sea-level rise. This gap is filled almost instantaneously by an ebb-dominated crevasse splay deposit, in which the daily rhythm of ebb and flood can be recognised in the sediments of the lower part and the fortnightly spring and neap tide alternation in the upper part. Crevassing is also considered important by the eventual flooding of the surface peat which is covered by about 1 m of inter- and supratidal deposits. Chaotic and catastrophic crevasse-splay channels in the surface peat are the precursors of the eventual flooding of the peat. Based on the observations in the excavation it is concluded that the current models of Holocene infill of coastal plains based on cores: often promote a gradualness which in reality dots not exist. (C) 1999 INQUA/Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.
