Geomagnetic Secular Variation in Texas over the Last 17,000 Years: High-Intensity Geomagnetic Field ‘Spike’ Observed at ca. 3000 cal BP

Abstract:

By observing the fluctuations in direction and intensity of the Earth’s magnetic field through time, we increase our understanding of the fluid motions in the Earth’s outer core that sustain the geomagnetic field, the geodynamo. Recent archaeomagnetic studies in the Near East have proposed extremely rapid increases - ‘spikes’ - in geomagnetic field intensity ca. 3000 years ago that have proved problematic for our current understanding of core-flow. However, until now, these geomagnetic spikes had not been observed outside of the Near East, where they have been found in metallurgical slag and mud brick walls.

We present a new fully-oriented, geomagnetic secular variation and relative palaeointensity (RPI) record for the last 17,000 years from Hall’s Cave, Texas. Sediment washed into the cave has formed a continuous stratigraphic sequence that is at least 3.5 m thick. Within the stable, cool climate of the cave, pedogenic and bioturbation processes are almost non-existent, thereby limiting post-depositional physical and geochemical alteration of the magnetic record. The sub-aerial and subterranean setting of the sedimentary sequence in Hall’s Cave enabled us to collect oriented palaeomagnetic cubes from an excavated section through the sequence.

The palaeomagnetic samples yielded high-quality vectors. An age model for the sequence, determined using 57 AMS ¹⁴C-dates on individual bones from microvertebrate, was combined with the palaeomagnetic data to construct a secular variation record. The record is in broad agreement with predictions by Holocene field models for the site’s location. However, at ca. 3000 years ago, the RPI data indicate an almost four-fold increase in geomagnetic field intensity lasting several hundred years and contemporaneous with the more short-lived, decadal-scale spikes reported from the Near East. Evidence for this extreme intensity event outside of the Near East has major implications for our current understanding of core-dynamics.