Abstract Plio-Pleistocene records of ice-rafted detritus suggest NW European ice sheets regularly reached coastlines. However, these records provide limited insight on the frequency, extent and dynamics of ice sheets delivering the detritus. Three-dimensional reflection seismic data of the NW European glaciated margin have previously documented buried landforms that inform us on these uncertainties. This paper reviews and combines these existing records with new seismic geomorphological observations to catalogue landform occurrence along the European glaciated margin and considers how they relate to ice sheet history. The compilation shows Early Pleistocene ice sheets regularly advanced across the continental shelves. Early Pleistocene sea-level reconstructions demonstrate lower magnitude fluctuations compared to the Middle–Late Pleistocene, and more extensive/frequent Early Pleistocene glaciation provides a possible mismatch with sea-level reconstructions. This evidence is discussed with global records of glaciation to consider possible impacts on our wider understanding of Plio-Pleistocene climate changes, in particular how well Early Pleistocene sea-level records capture ice sheet volume changes. Resolving such issues relies on how well landforms are dated, whether they can be correlated with other proxy datasets, and how accurately these proxies reconstruct the magnitudes of past climatic changes. Many questions about Pleistocene glaciation in Europe and elsewhere remain.

Abstract Pleistocene vertebrate fossils are prominently known from several regions across the Indian Subcontinent including the Siwalik Hills, the numerous river valleys across India and some cave sites. Unfortunately, most of this evidence is lacking a robust chronological framework and very few fossil specimens have been subjected to absolute dating methods. All of the known fossil evidence is found in diverse sedimentary contexts and these faunal assemblages have mostly been assigned broad or relative age brackets such as Early Pleistocene (i.e. the Pinjore Formation of the Upper Siwalik Subgroup) and Late Pleistocene (almost all the remaining fossil vertebrate fauna in the rest of the Subcontinent). This paper discusses contextual and chronological perspectives and associated interpretative issues of open-air Pleistocene faunal sites south of the Siwalik Hills, such as north-central and peninsular India. For instance, the virtual lack of Early and Middle Pleistocene fauna across most of India requires consideration and explanations beyond just the lack of absolute dates. A general review of the known data demonstrates a critical need for absolute dates for the various fauna as well as more rigorous field and lab methods for Indian palaeontology in general, and to avoid erroneous implications for Indian palaeoanthropology.

ABSTRACT The Cenozoic accretionary complex in the Calabrian Arc, southern Italy, contains hectometric- to kilometric-scale exposures of basalt, gabbro, and serpentinite that have been interpreted as dismembered fragments of Alpine Tethys ocean crust because of their incomplete nature with respect to the traditional view of a complete ophiolite sequence. We present new geologic mapping, geochemistry, and geochronology of one of these units at Timpa di Pietrasasso near the town of Terranova di Pollino in the Basilicata region that exposes Jurassic Tethyan pillow basalt and chert that are separated from gabbro and serpentinite by a fault. The gabbro in the footwall is Permian in age, indicated by U-Pb zircon ages of 284 ± 6 Ma, 293 ± 6 Ma, and 295 ± 4 Ma, linking it to gabbros that underplated continental crust after the Permo-Carboniferous Variscan Orogeny. The gabbro first underwent amphibolite-facies metamorphism, then developed a greenschist-facies mylonitic foliation near the fault surface that is crosscut by undeformed Jurassic-aged dikes of Tethyan origin, indicating that deformation is early Tethyan or pre-Tethyan in age. The underlying serpentinite is tectonically interleaved with blocks of Variscan lower crust, indicating that the missing upper plate of the extensional detachment complex was continental in origin. These features indicate that the Timpa di Pietrasasso unit preserves a low-angle detachment fault that developed in a hyperextended continental margin of the Alpine Tethys.