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THEAD'S
| Climate and Solar Activity
Evidence
for climatic change is everywhere. Severe drought also
came to the Colorado Plateau between
565 and 614. A humid period beginning about 688 is
noted
in western North America and the Yucatan Peninsula
in Mexico. In California, bogs were drying up while
droughts on plateaus cluster around the early 600s,
and Walker Lake would later come out of its dry
spell. From about 550, and for 500 years thereafter
(until
the next cycle), the American southwest would be
hit with frequent droughts.100 Records of frosts recorded
in tree rings from the White Mountains indicate
frost
events in 601, 628, and 687, about the same time
as major
volcanic eruptions. A warming climate encouraged the
Norse to voyage to the extreme north of North America
and Iceland, indicating the ice cap was much smaller
than today.
Asia’s dry period ended, and afterward, a wet
period began. China’s droughts and occasional
floods of the 6th and 7th Centuries transformed
into a more or less uniform raininess in the 8th
Century.
In addition, the number of severe winters in China
went from a minimum to a maximum.
Between 459 and 484 the “Red Wall” was
built to keep the Huns out, but at this point in
time it was beginning to be submerged under the
waves of
the Caspian Sea; today it runs are more than eleven
kilometers (18 miles) from the shore. There, in
the Caspian Sea, one can also see the sunken port
of Aboskum,
and a number of houses and towns can be seen in
their watery abyss in different parts of the basin.
It seems
the sea stood at least five meters (15 feet) below
its present level prior to this cycle, after which
its waters rose.
For the Mediterranean as a whole, the prevailing dry
climate came to an end with the close of the cycle.
However, the eastern Mediterranean had drought between
591 and 640, as indicated by some writings during that
time. In Germany the dry climate continued into the
mid-11th Century, but this was interrupted with rains
that rose lake levels in the 8th Century. Alpine passes
were once again opened with heavy traffic for the first
time since 1100 BC. The ruins of Olympia were discovered
beneath a three-meter (15-foot) accumulation of silt.
Could this be evidence of torrential rains washing
away topsoil? One expert thinks so.
Still an unsolved mystery is the alluvial (water-carved)
deposits found throughout the Mediterranean Basin,
temperate Europe, and western Asia. How were they created?
Could they be one sign of what so weakened civilizations
around 600?
Solar activity and auroral displays bring the solar
linkage of FEM into the picture at this time. For
example, during the birth of Saint Columba (521-522)
a very
intense and bright aurora with every color of the
rainbow was observed. A few months later, Halley’s Comet
appeared, and for about one and a half years following, “stars
fell like rain” (28 August 532). Auroras and “blood
rains” were observed in Europe between the years
582 and 587, and for two of those years (583-584)
the auroras were so strong that it looked like
dawn during
the night.
Strong sunspot activity occurred in 567 and 745, particularly,
along with a number of other maximums (555, 556, 577,
585, 643, 654, 655, 664, 667, 714, 722). Years for
an above-normal number of auroras were 565 to 586,
620, 651 to 682 and 743 to 772. There was a solar maximum
in the 6th Century known as the Byzantine Maximum,
and a later minimum known as the Dark Age Minimum from
660 to 740. More information may exist, but many sources
were lost or are nonexistent, particularly for the
6th Century.
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