5. Historická klimatologie
5.1 Definice a vývoj historické klimatologie
Historical climatology is defined as a research field situated at the interface of climatology
and (environmental) history, dealing mainly with documentary evidence and using the
methodology of both climatology and history. It is directed towards the following three
objectives:
a) It aims at reconstructing temporal and spatial patterns of weather and climate as well as
climate related natural disasters for the period prior to the creation of national meteorological
networks (mainly for the last millennium).
b) It investigates the vulnerability of past societies and economies to climate variations,
climate extremes and natural disasters.
c) It explores past discourses and the social representations of the climate.
Brázdil et al. (2005)
5.2 Dokumentární údaje o počasí
5.2.1 Zdroje vyprávěcí povahy
anály, kroniky, paměti atd.
5.2.2 Vizuální denní pozorování počasí
5.2.3 Obrazové dokumenty
5.2.4 Liturgické prameny
Rogation services (rogativas) of the Spanish church - documentary proxy climatic indicator
5.2.5 Prameny ekonomické povahy
Knihy počtů města Loun (SZ Čechy)
Informace o pravidelných sobotních výplatách mezd za zemědělské a různé obecní práce (ve
vztahu k počasí - např. vysekávání ledu mezi mlýnskými koly a u mlýnů na řece Ohři,
odklízení sněhu, žňové práce)
5.2.6 Lodní deníky
The sailing ship of the great of sail was the highest technological achievement of its time.
They created, unintentionally, a near-global network of weather observation platforms.
Ships sailed the world’s oceans, trading, fighting, exploring and maintaining the great
European empires. Officers of all nations were obliged to keep logbooks, and in which a
careful daily record of the weather was included.
It is estimated that well over 120,000 logbooks are held in British archives for the period 1650
to 1850, with additional collections in Spain, the Netherlands and France (and elsewhere?).
This represents over 6,000,000 days of reliable and detailed weather data.
Until c.1790, the observations are non-instrumental and include:
1. Wind force (non-Beaufort until c.1836)
2. Wind direction
3. Notes on the weather of the day (rain, hail, snow, fog, thunder, cloud etc.)
Barometer and thermometer readings were not commonplace until after 1800.
Studies by the CLIWOC project (Climatological Database for the World’s Oceans: 1750 to
1850) have concentrated on data verification, calibration and on the preparation of a database
(285,00 entries thus far) and ICOADS collaboration – visit: www.ucm.es/info/cliwoc
Global coverage is good for the N & S Atlantic and Indian Oceans, but poor for the Pacific.
5.2.7 Epigrafické prameny
5.2.8 Ostatní dokumentární prameny
- Příležitostné tisky - moralistický spis faráře Víta Jakeše Přerovského věnovaný vichřici z 28.
prosince 1612
- Osobní korespondence
- Noviny
- Časné vědecké práce a sdělení
5.2.9 Dokumentární nepřímé (proxy) údaje
Proxy vine data
- beginning of vintage
- amount of wine
- quality of wine
5.3 Metody historicko-klimatologické analýzy a rekonstrukce
The index of record density Hz (Pejml, 1966)
Hz = k1P1/365 + k2P2/52 + k3P3/12 + k4P4/4 + k5P5
Pi - the number of observations (i - kind of records: 1 - daily, 2 - weekly, 3 - monthly, 4 –
seasonal, 5 - annual),
ki - the transfer coefficient (k1=84.1, k2=12.0, k3=2.8, k4=0.9, k5=0.2)
1- narrative sources
2 - visual daily observations
Kinds of climatic evidence from historical documents from the High Middle Ages
Prior to AD 1300: Reports of socio-economically significant anomalies and (natural)
disasters.
1300 to 1500: More or less continuous reports on characteristics of summers and
winters (to some extent also on those of spring and autumn) including reference to
“normal” conditions.
1500 to 1800: Almost complete description of monthly weather, to some extent also of
daily weather.
1680 to 1860: Instrumental measurements made by isolated individuals. First shortlived
international network observations
From 1860: Mostly instrumental network observations
Pfister (2001)
Kritická práce s daty – historické kompilace zpráv o počasí
Advantages of descriptive documentary data
• Good dating control and high temporal resolution.
• Clear distinguishment of meteorological elements in the narrative reports (e.g.
temperature, precipitation, snow cover, wind).
• Focus on anomalies and natural disasters.
• Taken together they cover all months and seasons
Drawbacks of descriptive documentary data
• Discontinuous structure of the records (due to the death of observers).
• Bias by the selective perceptions of observers.
• Mathematical analysis is simple but robust, however this may be a drawback for the
acceptance of results in the scientific community.
(Pfister et al., 1999)
Rekonstrukce teploty vzduchu a srážek
- index series (documentary evidence) - monthly: simple -1 to 1, weighted -3 to 3
- transfer function (index - measured value)
- verification - different statistics
- reconstruction
The diagram of the quantitative climatic reconstruction
5.4 Časové škály v historické klimatologii
Short term: events with a duration of days to seasons
Medium term: variations with a duration of more than a year
Long term: variations with a duration of centuries Medieval
Warm Period (MWP)
Little Ice Age (LIA)
Recent Global Warming (RGW)
Lamb’s climatic paradigm of the past millennium
Lamb (1984):
• Medieval Warm Epoch (AD 950-1200) (1150-1300)
• Period of climate deterioration (AD 1200/1300-1550)
• Little Ice Age (AD 1550-1850)
• Recent global warming (after 1850)
Fluctuations in the length of the Grosser Aletsch glacier (the Alps, Switzerland) in the past
millennium (corrected according to Holzhauser and Zumbühl, 1999)
-0,6
-0,4
-0,2
0,0
0,2
0,4
0,6
0,8
1000 1100 1200 1300 1400 1500 1600 1700 1800 1900
Northern Hemisphere - Mann et al.
Europe - Luterbacher et al.
-2,0
-1,5
-1,0
-0,5
0,0
0,5
1,0
1,5
1000 1100 1200 1300 1400 1500 1600 1700 1800 1900
5.5 Studium anomálií a extrémů
5.6 Rekonstrukce přízemního tlakového pole
5.7 Modelování klimatu
Doporučená literatura:
Brázdil, R., Kotyza, O. (2002): Současná historická klimatologie a možnosti jejího využití v
historickém výzkumu. Časopis Matice moravské 120/2001/Supplementum, s. 17-59.
Brázdil, R., Pfister, C., Wanner, H., von Storch, H., Luterbacher, J. (2005): Historical
climatology in Europe – the state of the art. Climatic Change, 70, č. 3, s. 363-430 (k dispozici
jako pdf).
Jones, P. D., Ogilvie, A. E. J., Davies, T. D., Briffa, K. R., eds. (2001): History and Climate.
Memories of the Future? Kluwer Academic/Plenum Publishers, New York, Boston,
Dordrecht, London, Moscow.
Ogilvie, A. E. J., Jónsson, T., eds. (2001): The Iceberg in the Mist: Northern Research in
Pursuit of a „Little Ice Age“. Kluwer Academic Publishers, Dordrecht, Boston, London, 263
s.
Pfister, C., Brázdil, R., Glaser, R., eds. (1999): Climatic Variability in Sixteenth-Century
Europe and its Social Dimensions. Kluwer Academic Publishers, Dordrecht, Boston, London,
351 s.