The Wolf Minimum was a period of low sunspot numbers (SSNs) and TSI between about 1300 and 1320 AD. It occurred during the cold period that marked the end of the Medieval Warm Period (MWP) and the beginning of the Little Ice Age (LIA) about 1300 AD.
The change from the warmth of the MWP to the cold of the LIA was abrupt and devastating, leading to the Great Famine from 1310 to 1322. The winter of 1309–1310 AD was exceptionally cold. The Thames River froze over and poor people were especially affected. The year 1315 AD was especially bad.
Jean Desnouelles wrote at the time, “Exceedingly great rains" descended from the heavens and they made huge and deep mud-pools on the land.
Throughout nearly all of May, June, and August, the rains did not stop.” Corn, oats, and hay crops were beaten to the ground, August and September were cold, and floods swept away entire villages. Crop harvests in 1315 AD were a disaster, affecting an enormous area in northern Europe.
In places, up to half of farmlands were eroded away, cold, wet weather prevented grain harvests, and fall plantings failed, triggering famines.
In 1316 AD, spring rain continued, again impeding the sowing of grain crops, and harvests failed once again. Diseases increased, newborn and old people died of starvation, and multitudes scavenged anything edible. Whole communities disappeared and many farms were abandoned.
The year 1316 was the worst for cereal crops in the entire Middle Ages. Cattle couldn’t be fed, hay wouldn’t dry and couldn’t be moved so it just rotted. Thousands of cattle froze during the bitterly cold winter of 1317–1318 and many others starved. The cold immobilized shipping. Rain in 1317–1318 continued through the summer and people suffered for another seven years.
The coincidence of sudden cooling of the climate from the warm Medieval Warm Period to the harsh cold climate of the Little Ice Age during the Wolf Minimum was not just a coincidence, as shown by at least five later, similar instances of which this series will be based.
Foot note
There are many consistencies within the current " Climate state" and Humanity should understand periods of History repeat very very regularly.
Thanks for dropping by.
Regards
DIBIrch.
Citation.
Literature- Evidence Based Climate Science (Second edition) year- 2016.
Cited- DJ Easterbrook.
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