When did the Northern Apennine become a mountain chain?

The purpose of the present paper is to bracket the age of the initial uplift of the Northern Apennine chain by means of all the available evidence. The collected data show that the age of the lacustrine or fluvio-lacustrine units which have aggraded in the intramontane basins is Late Pliocene in the northwestern tip of the Northern Apennine and mostly Early Pleistocene elsewhere. The age of the oldest terraced fluvial deposits, showing the initiation of incision, is mostly Middle Pleistocene. The uplift of the "summit areas of low relief" most likely took place during the Middle Pleistocene. It is concluded that the uplift occurring during Middle and Upper Pleistocene caused an area of rather low relief to become the Northern Apennine mountain chain. An eastward shift of the uplift through time is likely. (C) 2002 Elsevier Science Ltd and INQUA. All rights reserved.