Witchcraft and weather- more Little Ice Age

Chapter 5 ("A Vast Peasantry") of Brian Fagan's A Little Ice focuses on peasant life in Europe in 1300-1850, demonstrating how precarious were the lives not only of the peasantry but also the rest of society who depended on the food they labored to produce. While changes were happening in agriculture, Fagan points out that most farming was close to subsistence farming, without much of an infrastructure for distributing food throughout Europe or even storing it from year to year.

One particularly interesting bit was where Fagan discussed the very cold years of 1560 to 1600. He writes that as

climatic conditions deteriorated, a lethal mix of misfortunes descended on a growing European population. Crops failed and cattle perished by diseases caused by abnormal weather. Famine followed famine bringing epidemics in their train, bread riots and general disorder brought fear and distrust. Witchcraft accusations soared, as people accused their neighbors of fabricating bad weather...Witchcraft accusations reached a height in England and France in the severe weather years of 1587 and 1588. Almost invariably, a frenzy of prosecutions coincided with the coldest and most difficult years of the Little Ice Age, when people demanded the eradication of the witches they held responsible for their misfortunes.

In reading about this particular time period, I can't help but note that this is the time of Shakespeare's youth and early manhood, when he was working as an actor and writing his plays and poetry, with Hamlet first produced in 1600-1601.

The Great Famine and The Climactic Seesaw

Still enjoying Brian Fagan's The Little Ice Age. Here's what I earmarked in chapters 2 and 3.

Both archaeology and historical records provide portraits of medieval village life, but few are as complete as that from Wharram Percy, a deserted village in northeast England. Forty years of research revealed a long-established settlement that mirrors many villages of the day. Iron Age farmers lived at Wharram Percy more than 2,000 years ago. At least five Roman farms flourished here.

I promptly Googled Wharram Percy, and have added it to the list of places I hope to visit between Haworth and Scarborough. I also mentioned it to my brother and he said that he visited it last year, and recommended it highly. That's enough for me! Not only that, it appears to be a site where there is no charge to visit, and the hours are charmingly listed as "Any reasonable time." I'm going to love this trip :)

Moving on...

The climate historian Christian Pfister focuses on two crucial months that stand out in colder periods: cold Marches and cool and wet Julys. Such conditions marked 1570 to 1600, the 1690s, and the 1810s, probably the coldest decades of the Little Ice Age.

As a hardcore Janeite, it's interesting beyond all get out to find out that the 1810s, the period of which I have probably most about of any time in history, is considered one of the coldest decades of a 550-year time period.

Volcanic dust is some thirty times more effective in shielding the earth from solar radiation than it is in preventing the earth's heat from escaping...During the three years it may take for the dustr from a large eruption to settle out, the average temperature of much of the globe may drop as much as a degree, perhaps even more. The effects tend to be most marked during the summer following a major volcanic event.

Mount Tambora, in southeast Asia, erupted in 1815 and 1816 is known as the "year without a summer."

The Little Ice Age

Mercifully, I finished Gone to Earth
and sent it back to the library where it will gather dust until another poor soul is seduced into reading it. I'm overstating, of course, and I am glad I read it so that now I can reread Precious Bane
and see whether it really is as good as I remember it being now that I have another Mary Webb book under my belt to compare it to.

I'm off to the races again with Brian Fagan's marvelous book, The Little Ice Age: How Climate Made History, 1300-1850. One of the memes that's going around asks what book you proselytize for. Getting people to read this book is my mother's mission in life. Seriously. She takes global warming very seriously, and so she has me buy her 2-3 copies of this book from Amazon every couple of months so that she can give them to unsuspecting people who touch her life. So far, her mechanic has received a copy, as had her hairdresser, her favorite Safeway checker, the owner of the coffeeshop she frequents, and all my siblings and most of my nieces and nephews. I'm just now getting around to reading it, and it is wonderful.

It's well-written, interesting, and about my favorite time period in history...1300-1850.

Here's how the first chapter, "The Medieval Warm Period," ends:

Like the Norse conquests, cathedrals too are a consequence of a global climatic phenomenon, an enduring legacy of the Medieval Warm Period.

For five centuries, Europe basked in warm, settled weather, with only the occasional bitter winters, cool summers and memorable storms...Summer after summer passed with long, dreamy days, golden sunlight,and bountiful harvests...crop failures were sufficiently rare that peasant and lord alike might piously believe that God was smiling upon them.

I learned about the ocean currents and receding northern ice fields that enabled the Vikings to dominate Britain and reach North America. I learned that Britain was warm enough to enable a wine industry to flourish and threaten that of France. I learned about Notre Dame de Chartres cathedral, and how the architect's "vocabulary of color, form, geometry and symbol..." "...created transcendental effects that could heal and revivify the worshipers crowded in the soaring nave."

I read and learned and am happy. Next chapter..."The Great Famine."