~ eusss ~ 7t' a+; b-Lit ABSTRACT. .. ._. ._ KEARNEY, M. S., 1996. Sea-level change during the last thousand years in Chesapeake Bay. Journal of Coastal Research, 12(4),977-983. Fort Lauderdale (Florida), ISSN 0749-0208. New basal peat dates and older published sea-level indicators for the middle Chesapeake Bay document a very slow overall rate of sea-level rise in this area during the last thousand years, around ~0.56 mmlyr. This figure is significantly lower than known rates of subsidence for

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... he mid-Bay region (~1.6-2.0 mmlyr) and implies that most of the last millennium was characterized by a relatively flat sea-level trend punctuated by a major regression. The paleo-climatic record of the late Holocene suggests that the timing of the regression probably coincided with the Little Ice Age. Refining this picture of the recent sea-level history of the middle U.S. Atlantic Coast will require new sea-level information drawn from sources other than marsh sediments, which document regressions poorly due to slowing or cessation of vertical and lateral accretion processes when sea level falls.