Climate change threatening buried UK treasures

BBC News ^ | January 26, 2022 | By Justin Rowlatt

[Oldeconomybuyer]

Climate change is threatening to destroy treasures buried in the UK as the soils that protect them dry out.

A Roman toilet seat, the world's oldest boxing glove, and the oldest handwritten letter by a woman are some of the extraordinary objects discovered in at-risk British peatlands.

It means climate change could undermine our understanding of our past, say archaeologists.

About 22,500 archaeological sites in UK may be in danger.

The problem is that changing weather patterns are drying out some peatlands - the waterlogged soils that cover about 10% of the UK.

Dr Rosie Everett, of Northumbria University, is part of a team that has been assessing the effect of climate change on peatland archaeology across the UK.

She says a host of historic sites in peatlands are under threat, covering the entire sweep of the country's history.

There are Palaeolithic pathways up to 12,000 years old, and Bronze Age burial sites as well as the remains of more modern settlements and industrial activities.

"Peatlands represent such a small part of the ecology of Britain, but they have massive potential to tell us about our past," says Dr Everett.

While an archaeologist working at a "dry" site might find 10% of what was once there, at a peatland site they may find as much as 90% of the material culture of ancient communities, say archaeologists.

"The loss of peatlands would have big implications for the understanding of the country's history but also for our climatic history and our environmental history," says Dr Everett.

[Oldeconomybuyer]

Well played sir!

[VanShuyten]

“...in at-risk British peatlands”

I’ll start to worry when they start talking about having to use coal instead of peat to make scotch.

[laplata]

I stand corrected. Thanks.

[laplata]

Lol!

[Walrus]

Perhaps a strongly worded letter.

[Walrus]

You should be ashamed of yourself, gundog.

[Thommas]

Oh, for Peat’s sake!

[Boogieman]

It’s a different matter with peat bogs. It’s the ph of the bog, along with the lack of oxygen, that keeps the bacteria out that would normally accomplish the majority of the decomposition. They simply can’t live in that environment so biological matter can persist a very long time.

Dry it out and the bacteria would instantly come back and gobble everything up.

[Tell It Right]

Someone should ask a British "scientist" how come Pevensey Castle is a mile away from the coastline even though we know that 1,000 years ago prisoners in the ground floor would drown when the tide came in. (Look up Sea Gate and Pevensey Castle).

Of course, the obvious answer is that this was back during the Medieval Warm Period (high temps and high sea levels). Since then we had the Little Ice Age (beginning around 1300 AD, lower temps, lower sea levels) to move the coast away from the castle. Now we're in the Current Warm Period (since the 1800's) that's raised temps some and raised sea levels some, but evidently not as much as the Medieval Warm Period.

I'll worry about global warming at rising sea levels when the sea levels are back where they used to be at Pevensey Castle and at ancient seaport cities that are no longer by the sea. Till then ..... yawn.

[DannyTN]

It’s just temporary.

Once the sea level rises, they’ll be permanently wet.

Nothing to worry about.

[gundog]

How dare I?

I guess they’ve given up on trying to save the planet for the children. Now we gotta do it for Roman toilet seats, and who knows what else.

[unlearner]

Manmade climate change will sneak into your house at night, hide under your bed, and kill you in your sleep. Beware!

[laplata]

Thanks for the good explanation.

[cgbg]

Every kid now knows that they can go to school and get off easy if they say the magic words:

“Climate change ate my homework!”

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks SteveH.

Here's some more recent topics from the "my ass" desk.

• U.S. Judge Nullifies Results of November Offshore Lease Auction Over Climate Impact [01/28/2022]
• Federal judge cites climate impact in revoking Gulf of Mexico oil lease sale [01/28/2022]
• Collapse of Florida-sized glacier may happen soon, raising sea levels and threatening coastal cities - LINK ONLY [01/28/2022]
• Stanford scientists find the climate and health impacts of natural gas stoves are greater than previously thought [01/27/2022]
• Study: Gas stoves worse for climate than previously thought [01/27/2022]

[Winniesboy]

The retreat of the sea from Rye and Pevensey was caused by a mixture of land reclamation, longshore drift creating extensive gravel banks, and river silting. Nothing to do with sea level one way or the other.

Conversely, just 'round the corner' on the coast of East Anglia through Essex, Suffolk and Norfolk, the sea has advanced a good few miles since medieval times, and abandoned houses quite regularly drop off the edge of the retreating soft cliffs. Again, this is nothing to do with sea level. It's the result of 'isostatic rebound' - ever since the most recent retreat of the ice-caps, the formerly ice-covered northwest of Britain has been rising, while the southeast has been sinking, a sort of giant see-saw.

Both these examples illustrate how the shape of coastlines is affected by many factors, of which global sea level is only one.

[Tell It Right]

I respectfully disagree. Yes, the cliffs in the Suffolk are eroding. But no, I think it's not from sea levels being higher now than ever before.

Weren't sea levels at Suffolk higher in the Roman Warm Period (2,000 years ago) than now? http://www.touchingthetide.org.uk/assets/Documents/Tides-of-Change-2-million-years-on-the-Suffolk-coast.pdf (page 15)

I'm not saying the sea levels aren't rising now during the Current Warm Period. I get that they are, including at Suffolk. I'm just saying it's nothing new under the sun and in fact we've seen higher levels at prior warming periods in the past few thousand years.

And for this discussion I'm talking about relatively short warming and cooling cycles that last centuries each in the past few thousand years, not the large cycles that last thousands of years each. (The global warming alarmists aren't talking about 10,000 years from now, so I won't compare their predictions to climate history of 10,000 years ago.) So far there's nothing the Current Warm Period has thrown us that's different from what we've seen in the Medieval Warm Period, Roman Warm Period, or Minoan Warm Period. And yet they want us to think this time is some horrible apocalypse.

[Winniesboy]

I don't see the disagreement, since I didn't say the Suffolk cliffs were eroding because of sea level rise, but because of sinking land balancing rising land at the other end of the country (isostatic rebound). Of course that process began when the sea level was rising because of the melting icecaps, but is continuing as a purely mechanical process long after the ice has disappeared. I'm not entering the argument over the rate and causes of sea level change, merely pointing out, as I said, that there are other factors also involved in the advance or retreat of coastlines.

[gleeaikin]

“Both these examples illustrate how the shape of coastlines is affected by many factors, of which global sea level is only one.”

The isostatic effect caused by earth movement related to melting of the ice sheets is a factor in many places. Regarding Suffolk cliffs, they could have a lot of change in 2000 years. If they are in an area that is still rising (which I call The Bedspring Effect) then the water level would have been higher 2000 years ago, and the sea would be farther from some land areas now than previously. I was looking at a book on sea level rise and it gave a number of examples regarding how the glacial melt is still affecting North American coastal sea levels. This would be unrelated to the rising sea level that could be occurring from ice changes in Greenland and Antarctica.

[Archie Bunker on steroids]

Rising sea levels due to climate change have already hidden so many treasures of the ancient/classic world. Imagine what lays buried in the Mediterranean; old Greek cities that maybe in time we will be able to explore. The diesel chariots were so evil.