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Does climate have anything to do with human history?

Weather is one of the eternal topics of mankind. Thousands of years ago, ancestors began to look forward to timely rain and snow and appropriate sunny days, and it has not changed until now. Taking agriculture as the most typical and direct example, in the long process of historical changes, climate has had a very significant impact on human society. Whether it promotes development and progress or leads to stagnation and turmoil, it is always around everyone.

Dayu controls water in the east and Noah's Ark in the west. The flood may be the same memory in many civilization myths. Aristotle thinks that flood is not a simple myth, but a periodic atmospheric phenomenon. Just like the four seasons, extreme cold weather and large-scale long-term continuous precipitation will appear periodically. Even if we put aside the mythical era that is too long ago and only observe the recorded history, we can find the influence of climate on human society in many aspects.

Climate change: an important factor affecting the rise and fall of ancient civilization

Although Babylon, one of the four ancient civilizations, was born here, today, probably no one will think that Mesopotamia Plain is a region suitable for human survival and development: the climate here is dry, the soil is bare, covered with sand dunes, and like other desert areas, the precipitation is scarce and the temperature difference is large. However, if we go back to the time when the ancient Babylonian civilization was just established, the climate in the two river basins was not like this.

Geological and environmental change researchers believe that the two river basins used to have a humid climate, not a dry climate. During the warmest period of the last ice age, most areas near the Mediterranean Sea had a dry climate. However, due to the expansion of southwest monsoon and the nourishment of monsoon rainfall, a humid climate appeared in northern Iraq at 34-35 north latitude. Geologists have confirmed the existence of humid climate in the two river basins by radiocarbon dating, amino acid differential isomerism analysis and pollen analysis. So Mesopotamia used to be a "paradise" in history, when the geographical environment and climate here were very good. In that critical period of humid climate, ancient Babylon became a brilliant civilization. If there is not enough flow in the two river basins, how can the ancients get enough water to irrigate farmland? Without the rainfall brought by monsoon, it is difficult to breed brilliant civilization on arid and barren land.

People may be more familiar with the situation in ancient Egypt. Herodotus, an ancient Greek historian, called ancient Egypt "the gift of the Nile", and the periodic flooding of the Nile provided fertile farmland for the ancient Egyptian people to cultivate. But why does the Nile flood regularly? Climate factors play an important role in it.

The Blue Nile, an important tributary of the Nile, originates from Lake Tana in the Ethiopian Plateau, and its upstream is located in a rainy area in tropical mountainous areas, with abundant water resources. The precipitation in this river has strong and distinct seasonality, and the river flow changes greatly within one year. The amount of water in spring is limited, which began to rise in June and reached its peak in early September. The water level dropped from June 1 1 to February 1, and then entered the dry season. Due to this characteristic of the Blue Nile, the lower reaches of the Nile regularly flood every year, which gave birth to Egyptian civilization.

Both ancient civilizations and ancient Egypt in the two river basins declined or even perished around 2000 BC. Many studies show that during this period, the climate became dry on a large scale. The sediments in the Gulf of Oman at the mouth of the two river basins show that there was a drought period lasting about 300 years during this period, and the study of tree rings in coffins near the pyramids also supports this conclusion. Ancient civilizations were unable to resist the harm of long-term drought, so this led to their decline to a great extent.

Ancient India, located between the Indian Ocean and the Pacific Ocean, has a unique humid climate. In the past, people usually thought that the western invasion destroyed the ancient Indian civilization, but in fact, the ancient Indian civilization began to decline before the Aryan invasion. Meteorologists have found strong evidence of drought in India 4000-3500 years ago. Therefore, abrupt climate change is a possible reason for the decline of ancient Indian civilization.

Climate events: a natural "pusher" to change the historical process

In 2007, the Journal of the National Academy of Sciences published a new research report on the relationship between climate change and war, which was written by researchers such as David Zhang of Hong Kong University. This study uses data to prove the inference that the frequency of war and the change of population are related to the change period of average temperature on a hundred-year scale.

This study believes that the cold climate will lead to food shortage and the pressure of human living environment will increase. In order to cope with stress, the most common form is migration, or exile. Because mature agricultural societies will establish political borders in densely populated areas, it will limit large-scale migration, because the result of large-scale migration caused by food shortage or even famine caused by climate change is often war.

In China, the most typical war caused by climate change is the conflict between agricultural society and nomadic society. As we all know, in the continuous history of civilization in China, the nomadic tribes in the north have always constituted a pair of contradictions with the farming society in the Central Plains. Huns in the Han Dynasty, Turks in the Tang Dynasty, Khitan, Jurchen and even Mongolia in the Song Dynasty, and Manchuria in the Ming Dynasty ... Nomads have always threatened the security and stability of farming society.

In the humid and warm climate, both nomadic areas and agricultural areas are in a relatively comfortable environment. Once the climate gets cold, it will become dry. Because nomadic people often live in cold areas with high altitude and high latitude, the environment is harsh and resources are scarce. These marginal areas always bear the impact of climate change. Their nomadic range shifted to warm areas at low latitudes and low altitudes. In this way, it will invade the farming society.

According to Zhu Kezhen's division of four warm periods and four cold periods in the history of China, we can find the corresponding relationship. In addition to the first cold period, the second cold period from the early years of AD to AD 600, that is, the Eastern Han Dynasty and the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties, was a turbulent period. The third cold period is 1000 to 1200, corresponding to the Song Dynasty. At that time, the Song Dynasty coexisted with Liao, Xixia, Jin, Yuan and other minority regimes. 1300 ~ 1900 during the fourth cold period, the Qing dynasty from the north directly wiped out the Ming dynasty and replaced it. In contrast, peace and prosperity are more common in a warm climate: Wenjing, Zhenguan and Kaiyuan all took place in a warm climate.

There are more climate events with smaller time scales, and many of them have affected the historical process to some extent. The typhoon prevented Mongolia from invading Japan, the Atlantic storm destroyed Spain's "Armada", and the war between Napoleon and Hitler failed because of the cold climate in Russia. However, this is not the focus that people should pay attention to. We should realize that climate has played an important role in human history and will continue to play a role in the future. Therefore, what impact global warming will bring and how to deal with it are important issues facing all mankind at present.

(Source: China Meteorological News 2065438+3rd Edition, March 22, 2005 Editor: Tang Miao)