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Geochemical (element analysis, molecular analysis of organic compounds), physical, palynological, mineralogical and sedimentary facies analysis were performed to characterise the sedimentary record in Fuentillejo maar-lake in the Central Spanish Volcanic Field of Campo de Calatrava, in order to reconstruct the palaeoenvironmental and palaeoclimatic processes which controlled vegetation patterns and deposition of different sedimentary facies. The upper 20 m of core FUENT-1 show variations in clastic input, water chemistry, vegetation and organic fraction sources in the lake throughout the Late Pleistocene and Holocene. The temporal framework provided by C-14 accelerator mass spectrometry dating allows assigning the sequence to the last 50 cal. ka BP. Arid phases identified in the FUENT-1 sequence are correlated to Heinrich events (HE) and to stadials of the Dansgaard/Oeschger (D/O) cycles. Siliciclastic facies with high magnetic susceptibility values, high Juniperus pollen content, a low Paq index (aquatic macrophysics proxy index), a decrease in the relative percentage of the n-C-27 and an increase in the n-C-31 alkanes are indicative of arid and colder climatic events related to HE 2, HE 1 and the Younger Dryas (YD). Similar short cold and arid phases during the Holocene were identified at 9.2-8.6, 7.5-7 and 5.5-5 cal. ka BP. In dolomite-mud facies, the pollen data show an increase in the herbs component, mainly - Chenopodiaceae, Artemisia and Ephedra-steppe taxa; a low Pay index, a decrease in the relative percentage of the n-C-27 alkane and an increase in the n-C-31 alkane are also observed. This facies was probably the result of lower lake levels and more saline-alkaline conditions, which can be interpreted as linked to arid-warm periods. These warm and arid phases were more frequent during Marine Isotope Stage (MIS) 3 and the interstalials of MIS 2. HE 4, HE 2, HE 1 and the YD in core FUENT-1 were immediately followed by increases of warm steppe pollen assemblages that document rapid warming similar to the D/O cycles but do not imply increasing humidity in the area. Fuentillejo hydrology is controlled by changes in the atmospheric and oceanic systems that operated on the North Atlantic region at millennial scale during the last 50 cal. ka BP. Copyright (C) 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.