AsianScientist (Mar. 10, 2015) – Based on simulations of ancient climatic conditions, scientists have suggested that the whole of China was warm during the Song dynasty while the Tang dynasty experienced only regional warming. Their results, published in The Journal of Geophysical Research, might be able to explain the relative strength of each dynasty.
The Tang dynasty (618−907 AD) is generally considered a golden age of Chinese culture while Song dynasty (960−1279 AD) is thought of as relatively weaker though still prosperous. It has been proposed that the demographic, economic and military strength of an ancient dynasty could be related with climate conditions, since a warmer climate is favorable to national economy development.
The Tang and Song dynasties were two typical warm periods in the last two millennia in China, with temperatures comparable to early the 20th century. A team of paleoclimate researchers from the Nansen-Zhu international research center at the Institute of Atmospheric Physics were interested in the question of why the Tang and Song dynasties varied so much in terms of power even though both faced similarly warm climate conditions.
To address this question, the researchers investigated possible mechanisms for the warming over China during the Tang and Song dynasties. They performed a 2,000-year simulations constrained by the external forcings of the last two millennia using the Community Earth System Model.
As expected, their simulations indicated warm conditions in both the early Tang dynasty (650−700 AD) and early Song dynasty (950−1000 AD). However, the warmth was mainly seen in East China in the early Tang dynasty, and over the whole of China in the early Song dynasty. The warming in the early Tang dynasty was attributed to the localized increase of atmospheric net energy with favorable heat transport, whereas the warmth experienced during the early Song dynasty was explained by the increase in global solar radiation.
Based on the simulation and reconstructions, the researchers suggest that the early Tang dynasty warm period may have been a regional phenomenon in China, while the early Song dynasty warm period was a reflection of global/hemispheric-scale warm events that took place at the same time.
The article can be found at: Yan et al. (2015) Simulated Warm Periods of Climate Over China During the Last Two Millennia: The Sui-Tang Warm Period Versus the Song-Yuan Warm Period.
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Source: Chinese Academy of Sciences.
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