Study Finds 2 Ancestral Euphrates Rivers Drained Into Eastern Mediterranean 5.3 Million Years Ago
Updated
Updated · Nature.com · Jun 1
Study Finds 2 Ancestral Euphrates Rivers Drained Into Eastern Mediterranean 5.3 Million Years Ago
4 articles · Updated · Nature.com · Jun 1
Seismic mapping and sediment-budget modelling indicate the Late Miocene Euphrates began as two rivers—the Palaeo-Karasu and Palaeo-Murat—that emptied into a partially desiccated eastern Mediterranean during the Messinian salinity crisis.
The study links the Handere and Nahr Menashe deposits to those systems and dates their offshore drainage to about 5.45 million to 5.33 million years ago, before later avulsions redirected flow toward the Persian Gulf.
Fault reconstructions suggest tectonic uplift and strike-slip deformation drove the rerouting: the Palaeo-Murat shifted southeast around 3.6 million years ago, the Palaeo-Karasu joined it by about 2.8 million years ago, and the modern Euphrates emerged around 1.6 million years ago.
Model results show the ancient basins were roughly 10 times smaller than today’s but carried water discharge exceeding the modern Tigris, Euphrates and Nile combined, implying intense rainfall, high relief and conditions that helped build the alluvial Fertile Crescent.
How did a tectonic collision create both the cradle of civilization and the world’s largest oil reserves?
What does the Euphrates’s birth reveal about the future of the world’s most critical oil chokepoint?