HOLOCENE GLACIER AND CLIMATE VARIATIONS IN WESTERN NORWAY - EVIDENCE FOR EARLY HOLOCENE GLACIER DEMISE AND MULTIPLE NEOGLACIAL EVENTS

Lithostratigraphic and paleobotanical studies suggest that the Jostedalsbreen ice cap probably disappeared during the early Holocene Hypsithermal interval (ca. 8000-6000 B.P.) and re-formed about 5300 B.P. The equilibrium-line altitude was lower than the modern mean equilibrium-line altitude between 2595 +/- 85 and 2360 +/- 80 B.P., between 2250 +/- 65 and 2150 +/- 80 B.P., between 1740 +/- 75 and 1730 +/- 75 B.P., between 1430 +/- 45 and 1270 +/- 60 B.P., and subsequent to 890 +/- 60 B.P. The outlet valley glaciers reached their maximum Neoglacial extent during the Little Ice Age in the middle of the eighteenth century.