Definition
The Pleistocene Epoch is the first long period of the Quaternary , also named the “Ice Ages. ”
It started at the end of the Tertiary less than three Mio years ago with a remarkable cooling of the Earth’s climate, possibly triggered by the closing of the Panama land bridge (O’Dea et al. 2016). The beginning of the Pleistocene is set at 2,588,000 years ago from a stratotype section in Sicily (“Gelasian Stage,” Gibbard et al. 2010; Head and Gibbard 2015). This is close to the Gauss-Matuyama geomagnetic reversal and lasted till 1,800,000 years ago, when the first “cold guests” like the mollusk Cyprina islandica or the foraminifer Hyalinea balthica appeared in the Mediterranean and extended glaciations occurred on the continents (see also Table 1). The Gelasian was followed by the Calabrian (1,800,000–780,000 years ago), its end again close to a paleomagnetic boundary (Brunhes-Matuyama, Shackleton and Opdyke 1976). The Calabrian was followed by the Ionian Stage (Middle...
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Kelletat, D.H. (2017). Pleistocene Epoch. In: Finkl, C., Makowski, C. (eds) Encyclopedia of Coastal Science . Encyclopedia of Earth Sciences Series. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-48657-4_247-2
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