How rising seas transformed dry land into Venice lagoon

Scientists say Venice’s lagoon landscape was shaped by major sea-level rises over the past 10,000 years, transforming land once farther inland into today’s coastal waters. Researchers led by Samuele Ongaro at the University of Southampton combined seismic data with sediment cores from coastal basins across northern Italy, Slovenia, and northern Croatia to model sea-level change and reconstruct past environments, with findings published in Quaternary Science Reviews. Their results indicate the present-day Venice lagoon was previously dry land extending more than 30 miles from the coast, and that Trieste once sat over hills overlooking swamps and lagoons. Sea level rose in intermittent steps, sometimes up to 25 mm per year, forcing Mesolithic hunter-gatherers to adjust hunting and fishing. After three major phases, relative stability over the last 6,000 years supported settlements and farming.