Historical climatology

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The historical climatology deals with the effect of climate and its changes to historical societies. In addition to the reconstruction of historical climatic conditions, the focus is on the search for the social influence of slow climate changes and climatically-related extreme events as well as a cultural history of the climate that includes a history of science and perception . This often happens from the broader perspective of an environmental history .

For a long time it was located on the edge of social history and the history of mentality and was subject to the accusation of climate determinism . Since the current global warming debate, climate history has enjoyed increasing scientific and public interest, but there have been serious methodological problems. First of all, since the 1990s, weather profiles, climate parameters, general weather conditions and natural disasters should be created for the time before the establishment of state measuring networks, plus the social changes (co-) generated by these changes. Historical climatology is based on the collection of data from various sub- disciplines that come from various climate archives , the “archives of society and nature”. The latter provide time series from ice cores , bogs, lake sediments, pollen or tree rings. The former, on the other hand, provide much more verifiable information, with serial sources such as records of the annual start of the grape harvest being preferred.

history

The variability of the climate was first suspected from the late 18th century and was made common knowledge by authors such as Louis Agassiz (1807–1873). This was the only way to explain the traces of the ice ages and to show long-term climate changes.

Short-term changes in historical time were made clear by the pioneering work of Hubert Lamb (1913–1997), Emmanuel Le Roy Ladurie (* 1929) and Christian Pfister (* 1944). The research that began in the 1960s has made considerable progress. Initially, waves were identified which became known as the Roman climatic optimum or the Medieval Warm Period . The Climate in History conference in Norwich 1979 is considered a milestone in climate history research.

The Little Ice Age , a cold period between 1400 and 1850, has been researched particularly intensively; the Swedish economic historian Gustav Utterström introduced it to science. Only for this epoch can glacier advances be detected globally in the entire Holocene . Villages in the Alps disappeared, viticulture disappeared from Pomerania, East Prussia, Scotland and Norway, the olive trees in Tuscany froze to death. Parallel to or through industrialization, which burned the “underground forest” in order to gain kinetic energy and heat, i.e. fossil fuels, the climate warmed up again. Around 1840, the energetic equivalent of the coal fired in Great Britain corresponded to an imaginary forest the area of ​​the entire country. The Nobel Prize laureate for chemistry Paul J. Crutzen therefore suggested that the geological epoch of the Holocene end with the beginning of industrialization and from this point on to speak of an " Anthropocene ".

Since then, it has even been possible to trace the spatial courses of individual large-scale weather situations for the period from around 1500; however, neither attempts at reconstruction nor the repercussions of society in the form of so-called impact research penetrated into the Middle Ages. Subsistence crises or epidemics could in some cases be associated with particularly cold periods. With the help of accounts of landed property, the influence of the climate in connection with the Great European Famine of 1314-1317 could be shown.

Central Europe is so rich in written evidence that a differentiated picture of the thermal and hygric conditions can be created for the early modern period from around 1500 in sufficient density and quality for almost every month. This allows the assignment of the source statements to seven intensity classes (from -3 for 'extremely cold' to +3 for 'extremely hot'). For the period from 1000 to 1500, a seasonal resolution with at least three (-1 0 1) intensity classes is possible. Glaser (2008) compiled the results in a continuous series. Although the index information relates only to temperature, other weather information can also be extended. If one wanted to draw conclusions about climate change with this , it could have been that the chroniclers' imperceptible adaptation to these climatic conditions would have been reflected in it. But if medium- and long-term climate changes as a result of shifts in the frequency of the same weather anomalies are perceived in longer periods of time, the uncertainties, e.g. B. by the said adaptation of perception in importance. Under this assumption, three evaluation classes are sufficient to describe long-term fluctuations in seasonal resolution. If you determine which average temperature difference an index step corresponds to and filter out the extreme deviations, long-term temperature developments can be reconstructed. A model for regionalization was also developed so that the climatic zones are also reflected in the courses. The results are confirmed by dendrochronological examinations. This means that the search for continuous time series and the determination of credible statements about individual seasons loses its importance, because sharp deviations are reduced to unspecific noise.

Since the 1990s, the focus of historical climatology has expanded from the determination and presentation of mean values ​​to natural disasters (i.e. extremes). Long neglected as short-term events with a quickly forgotten effect, research has shown that social factors shape the perception, processing and course of such events to a large extent. Anthony Oliver-Smith's 1999 study of the catastrophic earthquake in Peru on May 31, 1970, which killed over 70,000 people, claimed that the colonial system had created structures that made society much more vulnerable (or less able to help itself) ) faced such a disaster. Further studies showed that the reactions of societies to natural disasters can also be interpreted culturally and historically (and not only scientifically). The urban fragility towards extreme events was particularly evident. Social groups are also affected by earthquakes to different degrees: wealthy groups can often afford more stable buildings and live in safer places. Cities were repeatedly paralyzed by earthquakes, floods, storms and fires or, in extreme cases, completely destroyed. The connection between city ​​history or disaster resilience - for example the development of fire protection or earthquake security, easily restored structures - and natural hazards has been examined in individual studies; there is not yet a complete overview (as of 200x).

Reminder of natural disasters

The memory of natural disasters is often reflected in memorial plaques for victims , in high water marks , in publications on certain anniversaries of an event or in social practices. In Japan, for example, millions of people have come together every year since the Kanto earthquake on September 1, 1923. A media society deals with disasters differently; They are also objects of reporting and economic activity: several hundred books were published about the 1906 earthquake in San Francisco, and photographs and the like were sold.

literature

  • Sam White, Christian Pfister and Franz Mauelshagen (Eds.): The Palgrave Handbook of Climate History. Palgrave Macmillan 2018.
  • Pierre Alexandre: Le climat au moyen Âge en Belgique et dans les régions voisines (Rhénanie, Nord de la France). Recherches critiques d'après les sources narratives et essai d'interprétation. Lions 1976.
  • Alfred W. Crosby : Ecological Imperialism: The Biological Expansion of Europe, 900–1900 , Cambridge 1986, 2nd edition, Cambridge 2004 (German edition under the title: The fruits of the white man. Ecological Imperialism 900–1900 . Frankfurt / New York 1991).
  • Kurt Brunner: Maps as climate witnesses. In: Communications of the Austrian Geographical Society. No. 147, 2005, pp. 237-264.
  • Manfred Vasold: The Laki eruptions of 1783/84. A contribution to German climate history. In: Naturwissenschaftliche Rundschau. Volume 57, No. 11, 2004, ISSN  0028-1050 , pp. 602-608.
  • Reinhard Klessen: Introduction to historical climatology. Results of a project seminar , Berlin: Geographical Institute of the Humboldt University 2001.
  • Dirk Riemann: Methods for climate reconstruction from historical sources using the example of Central Europe , dissertation, Freiburg 2010.
  • Christian Pfister : Weather forecast: 500 years of climatic variations and natural disasters (1496–1995) , Bern 1999.
  • Wolfgang Behringer : Cultural History of the Climate: From the Ice Age to Global Warming , Munich, 2007.
  • Rüdiger Glaser : Climate History of Central Europe: 1000 Years of Weather, Climate, Disasters , Darmstadt 2001.
  • Rüdiger Glaser: Historical Climatology of Central Europe , in: European History Online , ed. from the Institute for European History (Mainz) , 2012, accessed on: December 17, 2012.
  • Tobias Krüger: The Discovery of the Ice Ages: International Reception and Consequences for Understanding Climate History , Basel 2008.
  • Franz Mauelshagen: Climate History of the Modern Age 1500–1900 , Darmstadt 2010.
  • Simon Meisch and Stefan Hofer (eds.): Extreme weather. Constellations of Climate Change in Early Modern Literature , Baden-Baden 2018.
  • Christian Pfister: Klimageschichte der Schweiz, 1525–1860: The climate of Switzerland from 1525–1860 and its significance in the history of population and agriculture , 3rd revised edition, Bern 1988.
  • Ludwig Fischer (Hrsg.): Projection surface nature. On the connection between images of nature and social conditions , Hamburg 2004.
  • Rudolf Brázdil, Christian Pfister, Heinz Wanner , Hans von Storch and Jürg Luterbacher: Historical Climatology In Europe - The State Of The Art , in: Climatic Change 70,3 (2005) 363-430.

Web links

  • climatehistory.net , website of a network of researchers with news and resources on the subject
  • Uwe Luebken: Undisciplined: A research report on environmental history , in: H-Soz-u-Kult, July 14, 2010 ( online )

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Patrick Masius u. a. (Ed.): Environmental history and environmental future: On the social relevance of a young discipline , Göttingen 2009.
  2. ↑ Verena Winiwarter , Martin Knoll: Environmental history: An introduction. Böhler / UTB 2007, ISBN 978-3825225216 .
  3. ^ Christian Pfister: Weather forecast: 500 years of climate variations and natural disasters (1496-1995) . Haupt, Bern 1999, ISBN 3-258-05696-X .
  4. ↑ Martin Bauch, Institute for History, TU Darmstadt .
  5. ↑ For example Wolfgang Behringer et al. a. (Ed.): Cultural consequences of the 'Little Ice Age' , Göttingen 2005.
  6. ^ Rolf Peter Sieferle : The underground forest: Energy crisis and industrial revolution , Munich 1982.
  7. ^ Paul J. Crutzen: Geology of Mankind: the Anthropocene , in: Nature 415 (January 3, 2002), p. 23.
  8. ↑ Anthony Oliver-Smith: Peru's Five-Hundred-Year Earthquake: Vulnerability in Historical Context , in: Ders. and Susanna M. Hoffman (Eds.): The Angry Earth: Disaster in Anthropological Perspective , New York 1999, pp. 74-88.