The Younger Dryas stadial, also referred to as the Big Freeze, a geologically brief (1,300 ± 70 years) cold climate period between approximately 12,800 to 11,500 years ago (10,800 to 9,500 BCE), follows the Bølling/Allerød interstadial at the end of the Pleistocene and precedes the Preboreal of the early Holocene.