Seismotectonic and Paleoseismic Studies from Speleothems: The State of the Art

The idea that speleothems may record earthquakes is rather old, but it was only after 1950 that system­atic studies started on this topic. Presently it\u27s well accepted that karst speleothems (especially stalagmites) can be used as a tool for tectonic and seismic analysis. In the present paper an overview on the state of the art in the seismotectonic and paleoseismic analyses using naturally broken speleothems and/or still growing stalagmites is presented. Specifi­cally they may be important with respect to: location and epicentre of past earthquakes; their relative and absolute dating (within the last 500,000 yr. or so); magnitude of these earthquakes; improvement in the seismic hazard evaluation