Sure wish coach Grant believed in ANY type of warming.
Posted on 03/10/2005 8:19:28 AM PST by Squawk 8888
Ancient Icelandic sagas may be full of treachery, death and destruction, but the real villain behind all the foment could well have been climate change. According to a Canadian scientist, there's a direct link between changes in regional temperatures and the thematic content of the sagas.
The research is based on newly reconstructed temperature records gained from ocean sediment cores collected off the coast of Vestfirdir, the northwest peninsula of Iceland by scientists from the University of Colorado. Analysis of mollusc shells within these cores has provided an astounding, almost weekly, record of temperature changes in the region.
"The difficult social periods in the sagas and other histories correspond to periods when cooler winters were coupled with what were some of the coldest summers of the last 2,000 years," says Dr. William Patterson, an associate professor of geology at the University of Saskatchewan who is leading the research linking seasonal climate change and Norse sagas.
The new temperature record was gleaned from microscopically thin layers cut from the mollusc's growth rings, each layer representing a few days in the animal's submarine life. The layers were powdered and the oxygen and carbon isotope values measured to create a record of environmental stresses, that were primarily due to temperature, on the Icelanders.
The results of the research, funded by NSERC and the U.S. National Science Foundation, show that in Iceland during what's known as the Little Ice Age from about 1350 A.D. to 1850 A.D., there was an increase in what is termed "seasonality," with cooler winters, colder summers and increased temperature variability. On the other hand, temperatures were highest at 80 B.C., 850 A.D. (during Viking settlement), and during the 1740s.
These changes had a profound impact on early Icelanders, and they continue to have an impact today. A one-degree drop in average summer temperatures can result in a 15-per cent drop in crop yields.
"The sensitivity of these people living in this marginal environment is readily apparent when you reconstruct the temperature variation," says Dr. Patterson. "Prior to this research we could speculate that temperature was a cause, but now we can say there's a good correlation between summer temperatures and the social situation."
Dr. Patterson says the Norse sagas provide numerous points for climatological analysis and comparison. One of the early sagas (Egils saga Skallagrímssonar) provides clues to the climate of Norway and Iceland from 850 to 1000 A.D. Other sagas such as Edda depict the Ragnarok, a pagan tale of the twilight of the ancient gods, that starts with the fimbulvinter (mighty winter) in which much is destroyed during a period of many years without summer, heroes and even families turn against and kill each other, and the world is ruined. Though Edda was written in the 1200s by Snorri Sturluson, it is thought to represent a previous cold period in northern Europe about 2,800 years ago. Other less stylized records from the Middle Ages and later are easier to interpret in terms of the climate-society connection, says Dr. Patterson.
The findings are part of a larger research project that will document changes in North Atlantic temperatures over the past 16,000 years. This type of information is critical for the validation of existing climate change models.
But there were plenty of trees to the west and Newfoundland was closer than Iceland. I think they abandoned Greenland and were ultimately absorbed by the native populations in North America.
There was a thread a month or so ago on native (Alquonqin?) (spelling?) languages that have (or is interpreted to have) Old Norse names and pronounciations. I imagine that was Sunk’s doing as well!
Eric the Red - Greenland. And then made it to North America. Thank goodness!
Otherwise we may never have gotten the Red Green Show from Canada!
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