Palaeoecological analysis of mammalian faunas and environmental evolution in the South of France during the Pleistocene

The study of mammalian faunas has contributed widely to the knowledge of palaeoenvironments during the Quaternary. The cenogram method, a graphical representation of the mammalian community structure, permits the reconstruction of the environments and the inference of the climatic conditions. This method has the advantage of taking into account all the mammals present in a fossil locality. Applied on several faunas of the South of France, this method shows different phases in the climatic and environmental changes during the Pleistocene. From the setting-up of glacial cycles in the Pleistocene, the conditions become colder and there is an alternation between a rather closed environment during the interglacial periods and a more open landscape during the coldest periods of the Pleistocene.