The unexpectedly short Holocene Humid Period in Northern Arabia

Abstract The early to middle Holocene Humid Period led a greening of today’s arid Saharo-Arabian desert belt. While this phase is well defined in North Africa and the Southern Arabian Peninsula, robust evidence from Northern Arabia lacking. Here we fill gap with unprecedented annually sub-decadally resolved proxy data Tayma, only known varved lake sediments Arabia. Based on stable isotopes, micro-facies analyses varve radiocarbon dating, distinguish five phases development show that wet 8800–7900 years BP considerably shorter than commonly (~11,000–5500 BP). Moreover, find two century-long peak humidity at times when centennial-scale dry anomaly around 8200 interrupted adjacent regions. short humid possibly favoured Neolithic migrations into representing strong human response environmental changes.