Fig. 2

Variability in Last Interglacial sea-level time-series. Yellow bar: time-interval of Heinrich Stadial 11 (HS11)¹⁹. Orange bar: approximate interval of temporary sea-level drop in various records. Dashed line: end of main LIG highstand set to 118.5 ka (cross-bar indicates 95% confidence limits of ±1.2 ka), based on compilations in b and the speleothem sea-level “ceiling” (c). a GrIS contributions to sea level from a model-based assessment of Greenland ice-core data (blue)⁹, and changes in surface sea-water δ¹⁸O at Eirik Drift (black; this study) with uncertainties (2σ) determined from underpinning δ¹⁸O and Mg/Ca measurement uncertainties and Mg/Ca calibration uncertainties. b Ninety-five per cent probability interval for coral sea-level markers above 0 m¹¹ (brown), and LIG duration from a previous compilation (black)²⁶. c Red Sea RSL stack (red, including KL23) with 1σ error bars. Smoothings are shown to highlight general trends only, and represent simple polynomial regressions with 68% and 95% confidence limits (orange shading and black dashes, respectively). Purple line indicates the sea-level “ceiling” indicated by subaerial speleothem growth (Yucatan)²⁴. d Probability maximum (PM, lines) and its 95% confidence interval for Antarctic temperature changes (red)⁶⁸, and proxy for eastern Atlantic water temperature (ODP976, grey)⁶⁹. Blue crosses: composite record of atmospheric CO₂ concentrations from Antarctic ice cores¹⁹. e Individual records for Red Sea cores KL11 (blue, dots) and KL23 (red, plusses), with 300-year moving Gaussian smoothings (as used in ref. ¹). Also shown is a replication exercise to validate the single-sample earliest-LIG peak in KL23 (grey, filled squares) with 1 standard error intervals (bars, σ/√{N}, based on N = 5, 5, 4, 4, and 5 replications, from youngest to oldest sample, respectively). Separate blue cross indicates typical uncertainties (1σ) in individual KL11 datapoints prior to probabilistic analysis of the record. f Probabilistic analysis of the KL11 Red Sea RSL record, taking into account the strict stratigraphic coherence of this record. Results are reported for the median (50th percentile, dashed yellow), PM (modal value, black), the 95% probability interval of the PM (dark grey shading), and both the 68% and 95% probability intervals for individual datapoints (intermediate and light grey shading, respectively)