The Middle Pleistocene, more specifically referred to as the Ionian stage, is a period of geologic time from ca. 781 to 126 thousand years ago.
The base of the Ionian Stage succeeds the Calabrian Stage (the beginning of the Brunhes–Matuyama reversal) and precedes the Tyrrhenian Stage or Upper Pleistocene, which in turn spans from the beginning of the last interglacial (Marine isotopic stage 5) to the base of the Holocene (~10.5 ka).
Although experts are not yet in agreement on how to subdivide the stages of the Pleistocene epoch, a possible international consensus on one subdivision of the Pleistocene epoch called the Ionian Stage exists. The Ionian stage includes all of the European Sicilian Stage and the first part of the Tyrrhenian Stage.
Read more about Middle Pleistocene: Origin, Faunal Stages
Famous quotes containing the word middle:
“In the middle years of childhood, it is more important to keep alive and glowing the interest in finding out and to support this interest with skills and techniques related to the process of finding out than to specify any particular piece of subject matter as inviolate.”
—Dorothy H. Cohen (20th century)