  The deposition of varved sedimentary sequences is usually controlled by
climate conditions. The study of two Late Miocene evaporite successions (one
halite and the other gypsum) consisting of annual varves has been carried out
to reconstruct the paleoclimatic and paleoenvironmental conditions existing
during the acme of the Messinian salinity crisis, ~ 6 Ma, when thick evaporite
deposits accumulated on the floor of the Mediterranean basin. Spectral analyses
of these varved evaporitic successions reveal significant periodicity peaks at
around 3-5, 9, 11-13, 20-27 and 50-100 yr. A comparison with modern
precipitation data in the western Mediterranean shows that during the acme of
the Messinian salinity crisis the climate was not in a permanent evaporitic
stage, but in a dynamic situation where evaporite deposition was controlled by
quasi-periodic climate oscillations with similarity to modern analogs including
Quasi-Biennial Oscillation, El Ni\~no Southern Oscillation, and decadal to
secular lunar- and solar-induced cycles. Particularly we found a significant
quasi-decadal oscillation with a prominent 9-year peak that is commonly found
also in modern temperature records and is present in the contemporary Atlantic
Multidecadal Oscillation (AMO) index and Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO)
index. These cyclicities are common to both ancient and modern climate records
because they can be associated with solar and solar-lunar tidal cycles.
