Sea level change has to be regarded as a global problem, influencing the human population not only in present days. Even in early phases of cultural development human populations have been faced with marine transgressions and changes of climate and the natural environment.
In order to investigate longer termed trends (on the millennial time scale) the Baltic Sea has been selected as a model region for an interdisciplinary research project SINCOS (Sinking Coasts – Geosphere Ecosphere and Anthroposphere of the Holocene Southern Baltic Sea) because changes in crustal vertical displacement interacting with eustatically driven sea level rise and climatic–meteorological influence to coastal morphogenesis can be studied in an exceptional manner, here. In the southern Baltic area where sinking coasts cause permanent transgression of the sea, remnants of human settlements are preserved under water, recording the reaction of the human population living in the ancient coastal zones since Mesolithic times.
As study area served the southern coast of the Baltic Sea where the process of a retreating coastline initialized by the Littorina transgression about 8 000 cal. BP that shifted the environment from fresh water to brackish/marine conditions can be studied here directly in relation to global sea level rise.
For the development of a model first, proxy data have been acquired in order to reconstruct the process and the effect of Littorina transgression within the research area. Data acquisition was mainly bound to sea expeditions. By methods of marine geology and underwater archaeology samples and information have been acquired which did provide the proxy–data for the reconstruction of palaeoclimate, sea level rise, palaeoecology and socio– economic development of the human population having lived along the palaeo–coastlines.
Modelling procedures have been used for the historical reconstruction of palaeolandscapes submerged by the Holocene sea level rise.
For the historical reconstruction a GIS approach was deployed to derive transgression–regression scenarios for the development of the Baltic Sea basin after the Littorina transgression. Regional and local models have been elaborated for the time span between 8 000 and 3 000 cal BP – a time of rapid sea level rise. As key areas for local models served the Wismar Bight, the Darss–Zingst Peninsula, and Rügen Island.