Big Rise In Sea Levels During Roman Times

By Paul Homewood

h/t Ben Vorlich

The Roman Warm Period marked an era of widespread climatic changes, of which one was sea level rise.

HH Lamb records the effect this had on migration, in Climate History & The Modern World:

Note the displacement of population from the coasts of the Flanders and Netherlands, as sea levels rose. This would surely have required more than just a few mm of rise.

Lamb talks of a meter of rise up to 400 AD, over the “warmer centuries in Roman times”, but this certainly was not a steady, consistent increase, as he records the recession around 200 AD.

It is difficult to detect any evidence that sea level rise in the last century has been any greater than some of those Roman times.

It is also worth noting what Lamb says about the migration of barbarian tribes from Central Asia, which set off a chain reaction of migrations, partly responsible for the Anglo Saxon ones.

It is a reminder that the climate was far from stable in the past, as often portrayed. Remember, as well, that the period of drought referred to coincides with a cooler global climate.