LITTLE ICE AGE Flashcards
What are the three key takeaways for the little ice age?
1.The Little Ice Age was most likely a global phenomenon, but strongest in the Global North
2.The Little Ice Age is associated with colder weather year-round and particularly harsh winters
3.The effects of the Little Ice Age include immediate impacts such as crop failure and starvation, but may also include issues like political instability and religious zealotry
What was little ice age?
Global temps dropped from around 1400-1800
Why do historians refer to the 1600’s as a period of “general crisis”?
Crisis in government: expanding bureaucracy introduces inefficiency & corruption
*Political crisis of state vs. society
*Financial crisis: inflation via colonial imports & concentration of wealth
*Financial crisis: transition from feudalism to capitalism
*Cultural crisis: grappling with the legacy of the Reformation & the demands of multi-religious populations
*Climate crisis: the Little Ice Age is at its peak
(So many crises at once)
How can we tell the little ice age happened?
- Historical evidence
- “Natural archives”
*Historical evidence:
*Ships’ logs
*Scientific weather records
*Personal letters and memoirs
*State responses to crop failure and famine
*Paintings
“Natural archive” :natural proxies for historical records
*Tree rings
*Glacier cores
*Coral reef data
*Glacial spread
*Liminology
Possible causes of global ice age?
- less solar radiation via sunspots
- volcanic activity
- Smoke would block sun
- More sea ice + less warm ocean currents
- Less human emissions (cuz less human population)
How did farming change before the little ice age?
From everyone farms to feed them (so many crops) to specialized (only 1 crop)
How did military conflict & environmental crises fare for specialized farmers?
Not good
Famine :(
Much in Germany
Ppl did a lot of grain, and it’s sensitive to temp changes (u can guess how that went)
How was Scotland among the “first and worst” victims of global cooling?
- experienced heavy rains
-Crop failures particularly acute in the Highlands, forced people out of mountainous territory
Rise in the suicide rate: men three times as likely to die by suicide as women (very bad thing to do at the time , must have been desperate)
What does “earth is Iron” mean in relation to Scottish famines?
Connecting the conditions to divine punishment (referencing bibble)
What did the Canals and rivers freezing lead to?
invention of the iceboat (boat on skates)
*Several economies, especially in the Dutch Republic, depend on trade (trade routes stopped, land = too bad conditions. Water = frozen)
*Frost fairs on the Thames
*Merchants take advantage of blocked trade routes & food shortages (price gouging)
*Sea ice persisted for many miles off the coast and the ocean was terribly storm (boats can’t get to harbour, so gotta cart stuff across ice)
Explain how the southern northern war used the frozen waterways?
1658: March Across the Belts
*Swedish army marched across the frozen Belts, the three straits separating the Scandinavian peninsula (Sweden) from the European mainland (Denmark)
(Used enemies’ horses to test weight on ice)
*Defeated the Danish army and pushed Denmark into signing the Treaty of Roskilde, which forced Denmark-Norway to give up a third of its territory
What were the four major concerns (health wise)?
Hypothermia
Drought = scarce drinking water = people drink unclean water and get sick
Hungry ppl eat wild animals and vermin
displaced ppl and disease carrying
How was Colonial North America effected by this? (Carolina, Virginia)
Spanish settlements in the Carolinas fail due to drought = Spain focuses on Florida, England moves into the Carolinas (English colony at Roanoke “disappear” w/ droughts)
Jamestown colony in Virginia experiences extreme starvation (evidence of cannibalism)
How is the little Ice Age connected to the Indigenous “great dying”
Mass death due to disease
Because trade is so interlinked, once one tribe is infected it spread all across the Americas
What are the Impacts in Indian Ocean?
Heavy volcanic activity in the region, possibly the central volcanic cause
-They rely on rice (Rice is highly dependent on regular rain and submersion) - if drought ur rice is over
- This doesn’t effect European markets (don’t rlly sell it there)
