Is there historical evidence linking medieval forest clearences in Europe with the Medieval Warm Period?

Upvote:0

I seriously doubt you're going to find a publication from the era written by the local equivalent of Al Gore complaining about how the clearing of the forests to make new farmland is causing global warming...
And yes, that's tongue in cheek but it's also quite real. There's simply not going to be any period publications stating that they cleared the forests because temperatures were now high enough to make living in those areas possible.
So you have to go on what you already know: temperatures went up, allowing farming to extend further north, and this coincided with reduction in forests at those latitudes.
So either people cleared those forests for farmland, or they disappeared on their own and the now available land was turned into farmland. Take your pick (remembering that if grain and other food crops can grow better, so can trees, so why would the trees disappear on their own).

Upvote:2

I doubt you will find clear evidence for it. Dendrochronology, the science of dating by tree-ring analysis, can show fluctuations in temperature cycles, and has even been found to show growth stunting due to large-scale volcanic eruptions which caused a darkening of the skies for a protracted period of time (months rather than days).

Whether trees were cut down because it got warmer and the climate more conducive to growing cereal or grapes, cannot, in my professional opinion as a 22-year veteran Field Archaeologist, be conclusively proven without direct documented evidence. Anything else, such as the causal link suggestion piece you mention, are working hypotheses only.

More post

Search Posts

Related post