The Messinian is in the

geologic timescale The geologic time scale, or geological time scale, (GTS) is a representation of time based on the rock record of Earth. It is a system of chronological dating that uses chronostratigraphy (the process of relating strata to time) and geochronol ...

the last

age Age or AGE may refer to: Time and its effects * Age, the amount of time someone or something has been alive or has existed ** East Asian age reckoning, an Asian system of marking age starting at 1 * Ageing or aging, the process of becoming older ...

or uppermost

stage Stage or stages may refer to: Acting * Stage (theatre), a space for the performance of theatrical productions * Theatre, a branch of the performing arts, often referred to as "the stage" * ''The Stage'', a weekly British theatre newspaper * Sta ...

of the

Miocene The Miocene ( ) is the first geological epoch of the Neogene Period and extends from about (Ma). The Miocene was named by Scottish geologist Charles Lyell; the name comes from the Greek words (', "less") and (', "new") and means "less recen ...

. It spans the time between 7.246 ± 0.005 Ma and 5.333 ± 0.005 Ma (million years ago). It follows the

Tortonian The Tortonian is in the geologic time scale an age or stage of the late Miocene that spans the time between 11.608 ± 0.005 Ma and 7.246 ± 0.005 Ma (million years ago). It follows the Serravallian and is followed by the Messinian. The Torton ...

and is followed by the

Zanclean The Zanclean is the lowest stage or earliest age on the geologic time scale of the Pliocene. It spans the time between 5.332 ± 0.005 Ma (million years ago) and 3.6 ± 0.005 Ma. It is preceded by the Messinian Age of the Miocene Epoch, and fol ...

, the first age of the

Pliocene The Pliocene ( ; also Pleiocene) is the epoch in the geologic time scale that extends from 5.333 million to 2.58Turolian The Turolian age is a period of geologic time (9.0–5.3 Ma) within the Miocene used more specifically with European Land Mammal Ages. It precedes the Ruscinian age and follows the Vallesian age. The Turolian overlaps the Tortonian The Tortoni ...

European Land Mammal Mega Zone The European Land Mammal Mega Zones (abbreviation: ELMMZ, more commonly known as European land mammal ages or ELMA) are zones in rock layers that have a specific assemblage of fossils (biozones) based on occurrences of fossil assemblages of Europe ...

(more precisely MN 12 and 13) and the Pontian Central European

Paratethys The Paratethys sea, Paratethys ocean, Paratethys realm or just Paratethys was a large shallow inland sea that stretched from the region north of the Alps over Central Europe to the Aral Sea in Central Asia. Paratethys was peculiar due to its pa ...

Stage. It also overlaps the late

Huayquerian The Huayquerian ( es, Huayqueriense) age is a period of geologic time (9.0–6.8 Ma) within the Late Miocene epoch of the Neogene, used more specifically within the SALMA classification. It follows the Mayoan and precedes the Montehermosan age. ...

and early

Montehermosan The Montehermosan age is a period of geologic time (6.8–4.0 Ma) within the Miocene and Pliocene epochs of the Neogene used more specifically with South American Land Mammal Ages. It follows the Huayquerian and precedes the Chapadmalalan The C ...

South American Land Mammal Ages The South American land mammal ages (SALMA) establish a geologic timescale for prehistoric South American fauna beginning 64.5 Ma during the Paleocene and continuing through to the Late Pleistocene (0.011 Ma). These periods are referred to as age ...

, and falls inside the more extensive

Hemphillian The Hemphillian North American Stage on the geologic timescale is the North American faunal stage according to the North American Land Mammal Ages chronology (NALMA), typically set from 10,300,000 to 4,900,000 years BP. It is usually considered ...

North American Land Mammal Age The North American land mammal ages (NALMA) establishes a geologic timescale for North American fauna beginning during the Late Cretaceous and continuing through to the present. These periods are referred to as ages or intervals (or stages when ref ...

. During the Messinian, around 6 million years ago, the

Messinian salinity crisis The Messinian salinity crisis (MSC), also referred to as the Messinian event, and in its latest stage as the Lago Mare event, was a geological event during which the Mediterranean Sea went into a cycle of partial or nearly complete desiccation (dr ...

took place, which brought about repeated desiccations of the

Mediterranean Sea The Mediterranean Sea is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean Basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by Western and Southern Europe and Anatolia, on the south by North Africa, and on the ea ...

Definition

The Messinian was introduced by

Swiss Swiss may refer to: * the adjectival form of Switzerland * Swiss people Places * Swiss, Missouri * Swiss, North Carolina *Swiss, West Virginia * Swiss, Wisconsin Other uses *Swiss-system tournament, in various games and sports *Swiss Internation ...

stratigrapher Karl Mayer-Eymar in 1867. Its name comes from the Italian city of

Messina Messina (, also , ) is a harbour city and the capital of the Italian Metropolitan City of Messina. It is the third largest city on the island of Sicily, and the 13th largest city in Italy, with a population of more than 219,000 inhabitants in ...

Sicily (man) it, Siciliana (woman) , population_note = , population_blank1_title = , population_blank1 = , demographics_type1 = Ethnicity , demographics1_footnotes = , demographi ...

, where the

Messinian evaporite The Messinian evaporite deposit is a geological deposit of evaporites which was found on Sicily and named after the city of Messina. It was later found to underlie much of the bed of the Mediterranean Sea, including the L'Atalante basin. It was f ...

deposit is of the same age. The base of the Messinian is at the first appearance of the

plankton Plankton are the diverse collection of organisms found in Hydrosphere, water (or atmosphere, air) that are unable to propel themselves against a Ocean current, current (or wind). The individual organisms constituting plankton are called plankt ...

foram Foraminifera (; Latin for "hole bearers"; informally called "forams") are single-celled organisms, members of a phylum or class of amoeboid protists characterized by streaming granular ectoplasm for catching food and other uses; and commonly an ...

species ''Globorotalia conomiozea'' and is stratigraphically in the middle of magnetic chronozone C3Br.1r. The

Global Boundary Stratotype Section and Point A Global Boundary Stratotype Section and Point (GSSP) is an internationally agreed upon reference point on a stratigraphic section which defines the lower boundary of a stage on the geologic time scale. The effort to define GSSPs is conducted b ...

for the Messinian is located in a section at Oued Akrech, near the Moroccan capital

Rabat Rabat (, also , ; ar, الرِّبَاط, er-Ribât; ber, ⵕⵕⴱⴰⵟ, ṛṛbaṭ) is the capital city of Morocco and the country's seventh largest city with an urban population of approximately 580,000 (2014) and a metropolitan populati ...

.This GSSP was established by Hilgen ''et al.'' (2000) The top of the Messinian (the base of the Zanclean Stage and Pliocene Series) lies with the top of magnetic chronozone Cr3 (about 100,000 years before the Thvera normal subchronozone C3n.4n). The top is also close to the

extinction Extinction is the termination of a kind of organism or of a group of kinds (taxon), usually a species. The moment of extinction is generally considered to be the death of the last individual of the species, although the capacity to breed and ...

level of the calcareous

nanoplankton Plankton are the diverse collection of organisms found in water (or air) that are unable to propel themselves against a current (or wind). The individual organisms constituting plankton are called plankters. In the ocean, they provide a crucia ...

species ''Triquetrorhabdulus rugosus'' (the base of

biozone In biostratigraphy, biostratigraphic units or biozones are intervals of geological strata that are defined on the basis of their characteristic fossil taxa, as opposed to a lithostratigraphic unit which is defined by the lithological properties of ...

CN10b) and the first appearance of nanoplankton '' Ceratolithus acutus''.

References

Sources

* * * *

External links

GeoWhen Database - MessinianMessinian online - living in an evaporitic world - Mediterranean areaNeogene timescale
at the website of the subcommission for stratigraphic information of the ICS
Neogene timescale
at the website of the Norwegian network of offshore records of geology and stratigraphy
{{coord, 33.9369, N, 6.8125, W, source:wikidata, display=title *06 Miocene geochronology Geological ages