Historical climatology, 1950-2006

This article presents an overview of the development of historical climatology during the past 50 years and how this discipline has contributed to a better understanding of past, present and future climate change. It not only shows how historical climatology has evolved from mainly the social scienc...

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Main Author: Adriaan M.J. de Kraker
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Société Royale Belge de Géographie and the Belgian National Committee of Geography 2006-09-01
Series:Belgeo
Subjects:
Online Access:https://journals.openedition.org/belgeo/12073
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author Adriaan M.J. de Kraker
author_facet Adriaan M.J. de Kraker
author_sort Adriaan M.J. de Kraker
collection DOAJ
description This article presents an overview of the development of historical climatology during the past 50 years and how this discipline has contributed to a better understanding of past, present and future climate change. It not only shows how historical climatology has evolved from mainly the social sciences as a special field of research and how it operates, but also how it has spread among institutes, universities and meteorological services throughout Europe.Historical climatology studies written sources providing indirect information on weather conditions, ranging from rainfall, temperatures and air pressure to extreme weather events. Discussing the wide range of written sources, it is explained what kind of a climate signal they provide and how historical climatology has used this indirect climate information or proxy data by developing a methodology of its own, which aims to transfer the proxy data into reconstructed temperatures, rainfall and air pressure time series. Then the contribution of historical climatology to a better understanding of climate variability and its impact of the recent millennium will be discussed by showing the results reached so far. In this respect the paper strongly focuses on temperature change which occurred during the Little Ice Age and in particular the Maunder Minimum and weather extremes such as storm surges and their impact. Finally, perspectives for further research are discussed by focusing on the Low Countries.
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publishDate 2006-09-01
publisher Société Royale Belge de Géographie and the Belgian National Committee of Geography
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spelling doaj-art-5a6eefc698464feb93b0d1615b24c72e2025-08-20T02:13:20ZengSociété Royale Belge de Géographie and the Belgian National Committee of GeographyBelgeo1377-23682294-91352006-09-01330733810.4000/belgeo.12073Historical climatology, 1950-2006Adriaan M.J. de KrakerThis article presents an overview of the development of historical climatology during the past 50 years and how this discipline has contributed to a better understanding of past, present and future climate change. It not only shows how historical climatology has evolved from mainly the social sciences as a special field of research and how it operates, but also how it has spread among institutes, universities and meteorological services throughout Europe.Historical climatology studies written sources providing indirect information on weather conditions, ranging from rainfall, temperatures and air pressure to extreme weather events. Discussing the wide range of written sources, it is explained what kind of a climate signal they provide and how historical climatology has used this indirect climate information or proxy data by developing a methodology of its own, which aims to transfer the proxy data into reconstructed temperatures, rainfall and air pressure time series. Then the contribution of historical climatology to a better understanding of climate variability and its impact of the recent millennium will be discussed by showing the results reached so far. In this respect the paper strongly focuses on temperature change which occurred during the Little Ice Age and in particular the Maunder Minimum and weather extremes such as storm surges and their impact. Finally, perspectives for further research are discussed by focusing on the Low Countries.https://journals.openedition.org/belgeo/12073BelgiumThe Netherlandsclimatic changeclimate impactclimate reconstructionhistorical climatology
spellingShingle Adriaan M.J. de Kraker
Historical climatology, 1950-2006
Belgeo
Belgium
The Netherlands
climatic change
climate impact
climate reconstruction
historical climatology
title Historical climatology, 1950-2006
title_full Historical climatology, 1950-2006
title_fullStr Historical climatology, 1950-2006
title_full_unstemmed Historical climatology, 1950-2006
title_short Historical climatology, 1950-2006
title_sort historical climatology 1950 2006
topic Belgium
The Netherlands
climatic change
climate impact
climate reconstruction
historical climatology
url https://journals.openedition.org/belgeo/12073
work_keys_str_mv AT adriaanmjdekraker historicalclimatology19502006