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1 If, within a vegetation type, fire regimes are climate dependent, then fire patterns should be synchronous at regional scales. If they are not synchronous, then fires may be dependent on local processes such as human‐induced disturbances.

2 Two fire chronologies were developed using 34‐radiocarbon dating measured by accelerator mass spectrometry (AMS) from wood charcoal buried in soil. These charcoal fragments were sampled in two study sites 10 km apart in the Maurienne valley (Southern Vanoise massif, Savoy, France).

3 Asynchronous temporal fire patterns were seen at Aussois and Saint‐Michel‐de‐Maurienne. This demonstrates the dependence of fires on local‐ or stand‐scale environmental forcing; any direct relationship with climate is therefore rejected.

4 Slash‐and‐burn practices are probably the main source of Holocene fires in the Maurienne valley. However, deforestation did not occur …