Weren’t temperatures warmer than today during the “Medieval Warm Period”?
) This is one of a number of popular myths regarding temperature variations in past centuries. At hemispheric or global scales, surface temperatures are believed to have followed the "Hockey Stick" pattern, characterized by a long-term cooling trend from the so-called "Medieval Warm Period" (broadly speaking, the 10th-mid 14th centuries) through the "Little Ice Age" (broadly speaking, the mid 15th-19th centuries), followed by a rapid warming during the 20th century that culminates in anomalous late 20th century warmth. The late 20th century warmth, at hemispheric or global scales, appears, from a number of recent peer-reviewed studies, to exceed the peak warmth of the "Medieval Warm Period". Claims that global average temperatures during Medieval times were warmer than present-day are based on a number of false premises that a) confuse past evidence of drought/precipitation with temperature evidence, b) fail to disinguish regional from global-scale temperature variations, and c) use the entire "20th century" to describe "modern" conditions , fail to differentiate between relatively cool early 20th century conditions and the anomalously warm late 20th century conditions.
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Climate
19 September 2007 at 10:38 AM
[…] Medieval Warm Period. Yet another popular myth. The short answer: it’s global warming, not just European warming. […]
15 October 2007 at 2:28 PM
[…] from NOAA. RealClimate, the blog for anyone interested in hardcore climate science, also presents a number of reasons why the perception skeptics have about the Medieval Warm Period are likely […]
30 December 2007 at 3:47 AM
[…] and had relatively little impact on the global averages. Dr. Michael Mann addresses this here (and for an example of a contrarian tactic that can make it appear otherwise, or that the current […]
6 January 2008 at 9:08 PM
[…] and had relatively little impact on the global averages. Dr. Michael Mann addresses this here (and for an example of a contrarian tactic that can make it appear otherwise, or that the current […]
1 February 2008 at 1:35 AM
[…] by mitigating our impact. And I know you like this place so yes, I did look here ==> RealClimate Here is an interesting article. […]
20 September 2008 at 12:52 AM
[…] of the little ice age and medieval warm period and many other discussions of climate change: RealClimate To summarise the ideas very simplistically I think this is what they say - the little ice age and […]