Soil geomorphological studies on the Prehistoric to Historic landscape change in the former mining area at the Vils River (Bavaria, Germany)

Soil geomorphological studies in the mediaeval to early modern intensively mined area of the Upper Palatinate indicate that native soils were affected by man already during Prehistoric periods. On a study site in the Hirschwald south of Amberg, a dry valley which was used as a transport route from the forested plateau to mediaeval ironworks at the Vils River, relief and soil distribution were altered intensively by soil erosion. Relicts both of erosion and accumulation are found. The relief in the dry valley is divided into four sections of erosion and two of deposition. Hollow-ways, single and bisected gullies and an alluvial fan interfingering with the Vils floodplain are of particular importance. Colluvial deposits are widely distributed and are situated on different slope positions like backslopes and footslopes or on the dry valley bottom and in the gullies. Partly, gullies have incised into colluvium on the valley bottom, and in the lower sections of the dry valley the gullies were refilled with multilayered colluvial deposits. Thus, two major phases of soil erosion are proved. A cluster of charcoal- ¹⁴C ages from the stratigraphically oldest colluvial sediments between 902 and 113 a cal BC argues for the fact that soil was eroded for the first time during the Iron Age period. Two Bronze Age ¹⁴C-dates also point to older human impact on the landscape. The OSL-age determination on the colluvial sediments leads to an overestimation of the deposition age. In summary, the results of the soil erosion ages are consistent with the archaeological findings in the environs of the study site.