Climate change killed off dynasties in China, Mexico

via EB

Climate change killed off dynasties in China, Mexico
Michael Sheridan, The Australian

NEW research suggests climate change led to the collapse of the most splendid imperial dynasty in China's history and to the extinction of the Mayan civilisation in Central America more than 1000 years ago.

There has never been a satisfactory explanation for the fall of the Tang emperors, whose era is viewed as a high point of Chinese civilisation, while the disappearance of the Maya world perplexes scholars.

Now a team of scientists has found evidence a shift in monsoons led to drought and famine in the final century of Tang power. The weather pattern may also have spelt doom for the Maya in faraway Mexico at about the same time, they say.

Both ruling hierarchies at the start of the 10th century were victims of poor rainfall and starvation among their peoples when the harvests failed.

...The cause was to be found in the migration of a band of heavy tropical rain, which moves in response to phenomena such as El Nino, scientists have argued in an article in Nature.

The effect was to end two golden ages that existed in ignorance of one another on opposite sides of the world.

The scientific team, led by Gerald Haug of Germany's national geosciences research centre, found a massive movement in tropical rainfall took place in early 900 in both regions.