Aeolian origin of China's loess (Richthofen)
Origen eólico del loess de China (Richthofen)
- Date
- 1868-1877 · confidence high
- Place
- Loess Plateau, Shaanxi, China
- Credited to
- Ferdinand von Richthofen
- Field
- Cosmos & Earth
⚠️ Disputed: the sources disagree.
What was discovered
After travelling through China between 1868 and 1872, Ferdinand von Richthofen argued that the loess of the Chinese plateau is dust blown from the deserts of Central Asia rather than a water deposit. His interpretation is the accepted one and made loess an archive of Quaternary climate.
The American geologist Raphael Pumpelly proposed the aeolian origin in 1866, before Richthofen, who developed and spread it in China (vol. I, 1877). The place is the plateau, not a single point.
What it led to
- study of palaeoclimate in loess sequences
- reconstruction of the Asian monsoons of the Quaternary