The nature, spatial patterns and forcing mechanisms of Quaternary climatic changes across southern Africa remain unresolved and contentious, principally due to the scarcity of continuous and robustly-dated proxy records. We present what we interpret to be a broadly continuous record of late Quaternary climatic change based on optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) dating, and mineral magnetic and diffuse reflectance spectroscopy (DRS) analyses of stacked palaeosols within an overbank alluvial succession along the Modder River, central South Africa. The OSL ages indicate that alluvial sedimentation occurred at a fairly steady rate, averaging similar to 0.15 mm/yr from at least 44 ka until similar to 0.83 ka. This suggests that the palaeosols are... |