The palaeoenvironmental δ13C record in European woolly mammoth tooth enamel

The carbon isotope composition (δ13C) of tooth enamel of woolly mammoth molars from Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Denmark and southern Poland was analysed and the data were complemented with previously published δ13C values from Sweden, Finland and northwestern Russia, Switzerland and Britain. The δ13C values display a NE- to SW-trending geographical pattern, with more depleted compositions in the northeast, suggesting differences in the diet consumed by mammoths in the northeastern parts of the study area relative to mammoths in the southwesterly regions. While the pattern is probably a reflection of a number of controlling environmental parameters, with possible additional contribution from physiological factors, statistically significant correlations of the δ13C values to δ18O data from the same specimens and to palaeotemperature estimates imply a strong influence of climate over the δ13C values. The δ13C data do not provide convincing evidence of any temporal changes in diet.