THERMOLUMINESCENCE DATING TESTS OF PLEISTOCENE SEDIMENTS FROM UPLIFTED MARINE SHORELINES ALONG THE SOUTHWEST COASTLINE OF THE CALABRIAN PENINSULA (SOUTHERN ITALY)

This paper presents TL age estimates of Pleistocene raised marine terr aces: from southern Calabria (southern Italy). It focuses on the datin g of last interglacial shallow-marine sand deposits. including several Tyrrhenian key reference deposits whose stratigraphic assignment is b ased on biostratigraphic evidence (presence of a Strombus bubonius fau na) and geochronometric data (amino-acid data calibrated with U/Th dat es on coral). The TL age estimates are obtained (in alkali feldspar co arse grains using their blue TL emission. They are in rood agreement w ith the IR-OSL ape estimates obtained on the same feldspar samples. Ou r feldspar TL method is tested on two Tyrrhenian key reference sites, Ravagnese and Bovetto. in the Reggio di Calabria area. Their measured TL age estimates (97 +/- 11 ka and 100 +/- 10 ka) are lower than their estimated geological age (i.e. Oxygen Isotope Substage 5e). The corre ction for longterm fading suggested by Mejdahl (1988). is tested on th ese two samples using a lifetime of 446 ka as estimated from both Cala brian and Miocene sand collected within the same area. This correction would yield preliminary TL ages (116+/-13 ka and 116 +/- 12 ka that a re in better agreement with the expected geological age. The applicati on of our it method to paleoshorelines lying below the Tyrrhenian refe rence shoreline of Ravagnese-Bovetto, yields stratigraphically consist ent TL age estimates. The TL method is also applied to two supposedly pre-last interglacial paleoshorelines which are geomorphologically old er than the Tyrrhenian reference shorelines, They remain however chron ologically undifferentiated. both by the TL and the amino-acid methods . Finally. the preliminary feldspar TL results obtained on the Miocene and the Calabrian sand deposits (> 1 Ma). suggest that our feldspar T L method is limited, in the SW Calabrian area. to about 200 ka. (C) 19 97 Elsevier Science B.V.