The Day the Sun Turned Blue: A Volcanic Eruption in the Early 1460s and Its Possible Climatic Impact—A Natural Disaster Perceived Globally in the Late Middle Ages?

Bauch, Martin

doi:10.1007/978-3-319-49163-9_6

Martin Bauch⁷

Part of the book series: Transcultural Research – Heidelberg Studies on Asia and Europe in a Global Context ((TRANSCULT))

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Abstract

Strange atmospheric phenomena visible all over Europe in September 1465 are interpreted as the result of a volcanic dust veil, possibly originating from a re-dated eruption of Kuwae in Vanuatu, in the southwestern Pacific. There is ample evidence (concerning temperature and precipitation) of years without summers from 1465 to 1469 and their subsequent agricultural, economic, and social impact. A second look raises doubts about assigning any clear pattern and reveals a fuzzier picture: an unusually coloured sun was more frequent in the Middle Ages and Early Modern time than originally thought. It is only non-European evidence that proves the events of 1464–1465 were truly global and most likely the result of a tropical volcanic eruption, though its consequences seem to be less cataclysmic than we would normally expect of a Tambora-like event.

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Notes

1.
Matthias von Kemnat, “Chronik Friedrichs I. des Siegreichen,” in Quellen zur Geschichte Friedrichs des Siegreichen, ed. Conrad Hofmann, vol. 1, Matthias von Kemnat und Eikhart Artzt: Regesten (Munich: Franz, 1862), 87. English translations, like all other translations in the main text, are mine. I’d like to thank Dr. Jean-François Fournier (Boone, NC) very much for his great help with turning this article into proper English. Cf. for Kemnat: Encyclopedia of the Medieval Chronicle, ed. Graeme Dunphy (Leiden: Brill, 2010), s.v. “Matthias von Kemnath.”
2.
Umberto Dall’Olmo, “Eclypsis naturalis ed eclypsis prodigialis nelle cronache medioevali,” Organon 15 (1979): 153–166; Umberto Dall’Olmo, “Meteors, Meteor Showers and Meteorites in the Middle Ages: From European Medieval Sources,” Journal for the History of Astronomy 9 (1978): 123–134; Umberto Dall’Olmo, “Latin Terminology Relating to Aurorae, Comets, Meteors, and Novae,” Journal for the History of Astronomy 11 (1980): 10–27; Malgorzata Hanna Malewicz, “Astronomical Phenomena in Central and East-European Medieval Narrative Sources,” Organon 18–19 (1982/83): 91–103.
3.
Isabelle Draelants, Éclipses, comètes, autres phénomènes célestes et tremblements de terre au Moyen Âge: Enquête sur six siècles d’historiographie médiévale dans les limites de la Belgique actuelle (600–1200), (Louvain-la-Neuve: Presses Universitaires de Louvain, 1995); Milène Wegmann, Naturwahrnehmungen im Mittelalter im Spiegel der lateinischen Historiographie des 12. und 13. Jahrhunderts, Lateinische Sprache und Literatur des Mittelalters 40 (Berlin: Peter Lang, 2005); Christian Rohr, Extreme Naturereignisse im Ostalpenraum: Naturerfahrung im Spätmittelalter und am Beginn der Neuzeit, Umwelthistorische Forschungen 7, (Köln: Böhlau, 2007), 517–546.
4.
See for example Christine Reinle, “Geheimwissenschaften und Politik: Mantik, Magie und Astrologie an den Höfen Kaiser Friedrichs III. und Pfalzgraf Friedrichs des Siegreichen,” in König, Fürsten und Reich im 15. Jahrhundert, Forschungen zur Kaiser- und Papstgeschichte 29, ed. Franz Fuchs, Paul-Joachim Heinig, and Jörg Schwarz (Köln: Böhlau, 2009): 319–348; Gerd Mentgen, Astrologie und Öffentlichkeit im Mittelalter, Monographien zur Geschichte des Mittelalters 53 (Stuttgart: Hiersemann, 2005); Jane L. Jervis, Cometary Theory in Fifteenth-Century Europe (Dordrecht: D. Reidel, 1985).
5.
Angelo de Tummulillis, Notabilia temporum, ed. Costantino Corvisieri, Fonti per la Storia d’Italia 7 (Livorno: Tipografia Francesco Vigo, 1890), 124, 133. This report is confirmed by a Verona-based chronicler who mentions the ceremonial entry of Ippolita Maria Sforza on the very same day in Naples. The future bride of king Alfonso, who she would marry on 10 October 1465, obviously attracted less of the bystanders’ attention than she hoped: “et così adì sabbato XIIII settembre MCCCLXV entrò in Napoli et ne lo intrare che fece, el sole per quel giorno, secondo e terzo successivi, mutò colore dal naturale, in forma che era morello scuro o sia azuro, in modo che magior admiration fu del caxo del sole, che de lo intrare così onoratamente la nova dona.” Giovanni Soranzo, ed., Cronaca di Anonimo Veronese 1446–1488, Monumenti storici pubbl. d. R. Deputazione Veneta di Storia Patria: Terza Serie 4 (Venice: A spese della Società, 1915), 226.
6.
In his diary, the Roman senate scribe Stefano Infessura reports the event: Oreste Tommassini, ed., Diario della città di Roma di Stefano Infessura scribasenato, Fonti per la Storia d’Italia 5 (Roma: Tipografi del Senato, 1890), 69. The Dortmund based chronicler Johannes Nederhoff may be refering to this incident in Rome, too: Johannes Nederhoff, Cronica Tremoniensium, Dortmunder Chroniken 1, ed. Eduard Roese (Dortmund, 1880), 334. A chronicle from Umbria mentions the same behavior of the sun: Giuseppe Mazzatiniti, ed., Cronaca di Ser Guerriero da Gubbio dall‘ anno MCCCL all‘ anno MCCCCLXXII, Rerum Italicarum Scriptores 21/4 (Città di Castello: Lapi, 1903), 80. So does a chronicle from Bologna: Albano Sorbelli, ed., Corpus Chronicorum Bononiensium, 4 vols., Rerum Italicarum Scriptores 18/1 (Città di Castello: Lapi, 1938–40), cronaca A. 4: 341.
7.
Die Chroniken der westfälischen und niederrheinischen Städte, ed. Karl Lamprecht, vol. 3, Soest und Duisburg, Die Chroniken der deutschen Städte 24 (Leipzig: Hirzel, 1895), 51. For a similar but independent description in a chronicle from Braunschweig, see Scriptorum Brunsvicensia illustrantium, ed. Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, vol. 3, Chronicon Brunsvicensium Picturatum dialecto saxonica conscriptum (Hannover: Nicolai Foerster, 1711), 411. Another testimony from the Maastricht area is Jos Habets, ed., Chronijck der Landen van Overmaas en der anngrenzende gewesten door eenen inwoner van Beek bij Maastricht, Publications de la Société Historique et Archéologique dans le Limbourg 7 (Roermond, 1870), 22. South Germany was also affected. Dated from the end of the 16th century, an annalistic compilation from Augsburg gives further proof: Achill Pirmin Gassar, “Annales Augstburgenses,” in Rerum germanicarum scriptores, vol. 1, ed. Johann Burkhard Mencken (Leipzig: Martinus, 1728), col. 1656.
8.
Sandra Wolff, Die “Konstanzer Chronik” Gebhart Dachers: “By des Byschoffs zyten volgiengen disz nachgeschriben ding vnd sachen ... ”; Codex Sangallensis 646: Edition und Kommentar, (Ostfildern: Thorbecke, 2008), 696.
9.
Tummulillis, Notabilia temporum, 123; Soranzo, Cronaca di Anonimo Veronese, 227. A Bolognese chronicle mentions the same: “In questo anno furono gran nevi, et fuè un estate molto piovozo ….” Cronaca Gozzadina [1258−1511], BU 574, Biblioteca Universitaria, Bologna, fol. 79r. The Bolognese government banned grain exports on 29 July 1465: Comune – Governo – Signorie Viscontea, Ecclesiastica e Bentivolesca, 306, “Liber novarum provisionum” [1400–1470], Archivio di Stato, Bologna, fol. 215r–216r.
10.
A chronicler from Metz reports a supplicatory procession due to persistent bad weather characterized by enduring cold rain. Philippe de Vigneulle, “Chroniques de la noble ville et cité de Metz,” in Les chroniques de la ville de Metz. 900–1552, ed. Jean-François Huguenin (Metz: Typographie de S. Lamort, 1838), 345. This is confirmed by another Metz chronicle: Henri Michelant, ed., Chronique de Metz de Jacomin Husson, 1200–1525 (Metz: Rousseau-Palletz editeur, 1870), 100.
11.
Johannes Dierauer, ed., Chronik der Stadt Zürich: Mit Fortsetzungen, Quellen zur Schweizer Geschichte 18 (Basel: Geering, 1900), 247–248.
12.
Werner Dobras, Seegfrörne: Die spannende Geschichte der Seegfrörnen von 875 bis heute. 2nd ed. (Konstanz: Stadler, 1992); Friedrich Meichle, “Seegfrörne und Eisprozession in Vergangenheit und Gegenwart,” Schriften des Vereins für Geschichte des Bodensees und seiner Umgebung 81 (1963): 145–170.
13.
“Ulm, von 1307 bis 1487,” Anzeiger für Kunde des deutschen Mittelalters 3 (1834): 230; “Jahrgeschichten des Landes: Von 1012 bis 1697, ” in Quellensammlung der badischen Landesgeschichte, ed. Franz Joseph Mone, vol. 3 (Karlsruhe: Macklot, 1863), 587; Meichle, “Seegfrörne und Eisprozession,” 149. But these reports only come from the northwestern part of the lake, today’s Überlinger See.
14.
A. Martin Freeman, ed., Annála Connacht: The Annals of Connacht; A.D. 1224–1544 (Dublin: Institute for Advanced Studies, 1944), 527.
15.
Angus Mackay, “Climate and Popular Unrest in Late Medieval Castille,” in Climate and History: Studies in Past Climates and Their Impact on Man, ed. Thomas M. L. Wigley, Martin J. Ingram, and G. Farmer (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981), 364.
16.
Jürg Luterbacher and Christian Pfister, “The year without a summer”, Nature Geoscience 8 (2015), 246–248; Daniel Krämer, “Menschen grasten nun mit dem Vieh”. Die letzte grosse Hungersnot der Schweiz 1816/17, (Basel: Schwabe, 2015); Wolfgang Behringer, Tambora und das Jahr ohne Sommer: Wie ein Vulkan die Welt in die Krise stﺰrzte (München: C.H. Beck, 2015); Gillen D'Arcy Wood, Tambora – The Eruption That Changed the World (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2014); Henry Stommel and Elizabeth Stommel, Volcano Weather: The Story of 1816, the Year without a Summer (Newport: Seven Seas, 1983); Richard B. Stothers, “The Great Tambora Eruption of 1815 and Its Aftermath,” Science 224 (1984): 1191–1198.
17.
Chaochao Gao et al., “The 1452 or 1453 A.D. Kuwae Eruption Signal Derived from Multiple Ice Core Records: Greatest Volcanic Sulfate Event of the Past 700 Years,” Journal of Geophysical Research 117 (2006): D12107; K. R. Briffa et al, “Influence of Volcanic Eruptions on Northern Hemisphere Summer Temperature Over the Past 600 Years,” Nature 393, no. 4 (1998): 450–455.
18.
Annual accumulation rates are calculated on the base of these previously determined ‘historical eruptions’, see Jihong Cole-Dai, Ellen Mosley-Thompson, Shawn P. Wight, Lonnie G. Thompson, “A 4100-year Record of Explosive Volcanism from an East Antarctica Ice Core,” Journal of Geophysical Research 105, no. D19 (2000): 24,432. There is a high error estimate, leaving other insecurities of dating ice cores aside, if these previous dated events are a result of misinterpretation of historical sources. The same critique from a dendrochronologist’s point of view, who claims that ice-core datings are in general several years too old. Mike G. L. Baillie, “Volcanoes, Ice-Cores and Tree-Rings: One Story or Two?” Antiquity 84 (2009): 202–215.
19.
A very short abstract by a US astronomer is the basis for all the assumptions surrounding historical documents about Kuwae’s eruption in 1452/53: Kevin D. Pang, “Climatic Impact of the Mid-fifteenth Century Kuwae Caldera Formation, as reconstructed from Historical and Proxy Data.” (paper, Fall Meeting, American Geophysical Union, 1993), 106. The usual citation of this abstract in all scientific journals refers to Eos. Transactions of the AGU 1993, vol. 76. Remarkably, however, the actual text cannot be found in this volume. This proves that Pang is cited frequently, but never actually read. The phenomena described during the siege of Constantinople, which Pang offered as evidence for a volcanic dust veil, are more convincingly explained as omen and fulfillment of older prophecies, and therefore not at all as factual, in a useful survey of the siege and the relevant sources by Marios Philippides and Walter K. Hanak, The Siege and the Fall of Constantinople in 1453: Historiography, Topography and Military Studies (Farnham: Ashgate, 2011), 214–231. Since none of the miraculous events is mentioned in two independent sources, and all phenomena turn out to have been predicted by ancient prophecies or can be explained directly as the divine protection leaving the city, we have no reason to think they actually happened. And the similarity to the ‘false fire’ seen after the Krakatoa eruption is very superficial, as the ‘fire’ over Constantinople is described quite differently and clearly supernatural: “Many people gathered and saw on the Church of Wisdom [= Hagia Sophia], at the top of the window, a large flame of fire blazing out. It encircled the entire neck of the church for a long time. The flame gathered into one; its flame altered, and there was an indescribable light. At once it took to the sky […] The light itself has gone up to the heaven; the gates of heaven were opened; the light was received; and again they were closed.” For this translation from the Russian chronicle of Nestor-Iskander see ibid., 222.
20.
Martin Bauch, “Vulkanisches Zwielicht: Ein Vorschlag zur Datierung des Kuwae-Ausbruchs auf 1464,” Mittelalter: Interdisziplinäre Forschung und Rezeptionsgeschichte (blog), April 10, 2015, accessed March 18, 2016, http://mittelalter.hypotheses.org/5697.
21.
Tom Simkin and Richard S. Fiske, Krakatau 1883: The Volcanic Eruption and Its Effects (Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institute Press, 1983), 154–159.
22.
Jihong Cole-Dai et al., A 4100-year Record of Explosive Volcanism, 435, table 2.
23.
For the concept of vulnerability see Greg Bankoff, Cultures of Disaster: Society and Natural Hazard in the Philippines (London: RoutledgeCurzon, 2003); Greg Bankoff, George Frerks, and Dorothea Hilhorst, eds., Mapping Vulnerability: Disasters, Development, and People (London: Earthscan, 2008).
24.
The French medievalist Patrick Boucheron realized this, although he has not critically questioned the validity of dating Kuwae to 1452/53. Patrick Boucheron, “Introduction: Les boucles du monde: contours du XVe siècle,” in Histoire du monde au XVe siècle, ed. Patrick Boucheron (Paris: Fayard, 2009), 9–30; Patrick Boucheron, “Kuwae ou la naissance du monde,” L’Histoire 347 (2009): 8. I thank Dr. Thomas Labbé for pointing me to this author’s publications.
25.
For the list of sources see Graeme Dunphy, ed., Encyclopedia of the Medieval Chronicle, 2 vols. Only the sources in Hungarian, Romanian, Russian, Greek, and Arabic without available translation have not been taken into consideration. From a total of 280 sources relevant to the decade of 1460–1470, 181 did not contain any relevant information on weather events, famines, or epidemics, while 69 did provide information of this kind. 31 sources could not be retrieved, either online or via interlibrary loan.
26.
Christian Pfister, “Learning from Nature-Induced Disasters: Theoretical Considerations and Case Studies from Western Europe,” in Natural Disasters, Cultural Responses: Case Studies Toward a Global Environmental History, ed. Christian Pfister and Christof Mauch (Lanham: Lexington, 2009), 17–40; Rudolf Brázdil et al. “Historical Climatology in Europe: The State of the Art,” Climatic Change 70 (2005): 402–406.
27.
Dierauer, Chronik der Stadt Zürich, 248.
28.
A. Bonora, ed., Chronica civitatis Placentiae Johannis Agazzari et Antonii Francisci Villa, Monumenta historica ad provincias Parmensem et Placentinam pertinentia 3 (Parma: Fiaccadori,1862), 59.
29.
Sorbelli, Corpus Chronicorum Bononiensium, vol. 4, cronaca A: 352, cronaca B: 352–353; Sigmund Rosicz, “Gesta diversa transactis temporibus facta in Silesia et alibi (1237–1470),” in Geschichtsschreiber Schlesiens des XV. Jahrhunderts, ed. Franz Wachter, Scriptores rerum silesiacarum 12 (Breslau: Max, 1883), 82.
30.
Henry T. Riley, trans., Ingulph’s Chronicle of the Abbey of Croyland with the Continuations by Peter of Blois and Anonymous Writers (London 1854), 443.
31.
Ibid., 444.
32.
“Chronica S. Aegidii in Brunswig,” in: Leibniz, Scriptorum Brunsvicensia illustrantium, 3: 411; Jakob Unrest, Österreichische Chronik, ed. Karl Grossmann, Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Scriptores Rerum Germanicarum; Nova series 11 (Weimar: Böhlau 1957), 23.
33.
The bloody snow might be the result of a particular alga. Franz-Christian Czygan, “Blutregen und Blutschnee: Stickstoffmangel-Zellen von Haematococcus pluvialis und Chlamydomonas nivalis,” Archives of Microbiology 74, no. 1 (1970): 69–76; bloody rain is often explained as Sahara dust that is carried away to Europe.
34.
Philippe de Vigneulle, “Chroniques de Metz,” 354.
35.
Rosicz, “Gesta diversa,” 83; Allegretto Allegretti, “Ephemerides Senenses (1450–1496),” in Rerum italicarum scriptores ab anno aerae Christanae 500 ad 1500, ed. Lodovico Antonio Muratori, vol. 23 (Milano: Societas Palatinae, 1733), col. 772.
36.
“Chronica S. Aegidii in Brunswig,” in: Leibniz, Scriptorum Brunsvicensia illustrantium, 3: 411.
37.
Bonora, Chronica civitatis Placentiae, 60.
38.
Sorbelli, Corpus Chronicorum Bononiensium, vol. 4, cronaca A: 368, cronaca B: 369.
39.
“Die Chronik Erhards von Appenwiler 1439–1471: Mit ihren Fortsetzungen 1471–1474,” in Basler Chroniken, ed. August Bernoulli, vol. 4 (Leipzig: Hirzel, 1890), 350.
40.
Philippe de Vigneulle, “Chroniques de Metz,” 359–361.
41.
Gerhard Cordes, ed., Die Goslarer Chronik des Hans Geismar, Beiträge zur Geschichte der Stadt Goslar 14 (Goslar: Selbstverlag des Geschichts- und Heimatschutzvereins Goslar, 1954), 114; Robert Reiche, ed., Die Chronik Hartung Cammermeisters, Geschichtsquellen der Provinz Sachsen und angrenzender Gebiete 35 (Halle/Saale: Hendel, 1896), 221; Die Chroniken der westfälischen und niederrheinischen Städte, 51; Leibniz, Chronicon Brunsvicensium Picturatum, 412; Die Chroniken der niedersächsischen Städte: Magdeburg, vol. 1, Die Magdeburger Schöppenchronik, ed. Heinrich v. Lamme[s]springe et al., Die Chroniken der deutschen Städte 7 (Leipzig: Hirzel, 1869), 410; Johannes Müllner, Die Annalen der Reichsstadt Nürnberg von 1623, vol. 2, Von 1351–1469, ed. Gerhard Hirschmann, Quellen zur Geschichte und Kultur der Stadt Nürnberg 11 (Nürnberg: Selbstverlag des Stadtrats zu Nürnberg, 1984) 577.
42.
Leibniz, Chronicon Brunsvicensium Picturatum, 412; Magdeburger Schöppenchronik, 411.
43.
Dierauer, Chronik der Stadt Zürich, 254.
44.
P. C. van der Meersch, ed., Memorieboek der stad Ghend van’t jaer 1301 tot 1737, vol. 1 (Gent: van C. Annot-Braeckmann, 1852), 279.
45.
Michelant, Chronique de Metz de Jacomin Husson, 104.
46.
Hermann Markgraf, ed., Annales Glogovienses bis z. J. 1493 nebst urkundlichen Beiträgen, Scriptores Rerum Silesiacarum 10 (Breslau: Max, 1877), 18.
47.
Dierauer, Chronik der Stadt Zürich, 254.
48.
Giorgio Sfranze, Cronaca, ed. Riccardo Maisano, Corpus fontium historiae Byzantinae 29, Series Italica Scrittori bizantini 2 (Roma: Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei, 1990), 187. Translated by Marios Philippides as George Sphrantzes: The Fall of the Byzantine Empire (Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1980), 92.
49.
Sorbelli, Corpus Chronicorum Bononiensium, vol. 4, cronaca A: 388–389, cronaca B: 388–389.
50.
María Desamporados Cabanes Pecourt, ed., Dietari del capellá d’Alfons el Magnànim (Zaragoza: Anubar, 1991), 279–280.
51.
Cherubino Ghirardacci, Della Historia di Bologna, pt. 3, ed. Albano Sorbelli, Rerum Italicarum scriptores 33/1 (Città di Castello: Lapi, 1912–1932), 202; Allegretti, “Ephemerides Senenses,” 773.
52.
Rosicz, “Gesta diversa,” 85.
53.
Dierauer, Chronik der Stadt Zürich, 255.
54.
Markgraf, Annales Glogovienses, 1.
55.
Bonora, Chronica civitatis Placentiae, 62.
56.
Rüdiger Glaser, Klimageschichte Mitteleuropas: 1200 Jahre Wetter, Klima, Katastrophen, 2nd ed. (Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 2008), 70, 82, 87, 92.
57.
Giuseppe Aiazzi, ed., Ricordi storici di Filippo di Cino Rinuccini dal 1282 al 1460 colla continuazione di Alamanno e Neri suoi figli fino al 1506 (Firenze 1840), XCVIII. The Danube flooding is not precisely dated, see Wilhelm Wattenbach, ed., “Annales Mellicensis,” in [Chronica et annales aevi salici], ed. Georg Heinrich Pertz, Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Scriptores 9 (Hannover: Hahn, 1851), 521.
58.
Sorbelli, Corpus Chronicorum Bononiensium, vol. 4, cronaca A: 349, cronaca B: 349.
59.
Luca Landucci, Ein Florentinisches Tagebuch 1450–1516: Nebst einer anonymen Fortsetzung 1516–1542, trans. and ed. Marie Herzfeld (Düsseldorf: Diederichs, 1978), 11. This is supported by observations for the Tiber river. “Cronaca della città di Perugia dal 1309 al 1491, nota col nome di Diaro del Graziani,” Archivio Storico Italiano 16, no. 1 (1850): 639.
60.
“Aufzeichnungen des Thorner Pfarrers Hieronymus Waldau,” in Scriptores Rerum Prussicarum: Die Geschichtsquellen der Preussischen Vorzeit bis zum Untergange der Ordensherrschaft, vol. 6, ed. Walter Hubatsch (Frankfurt: Minerva, 1968), 97.
61.
Chronicle of the Abbey of Croyland, 443.
62.
According to a local historian in the 1560s, based on municipal documents, see Cordes, Goslarer Chronik, 114.
63.
Johannes Lindau, “Geschichte des 13jährigen Krieges (1454–66),” in Scriptores Rerum Prussicarum, vol. 4, ed. Theodor Hirsch, Max Toeppen, and Ernst Strehlke (Leipzig: Hirzel, 1870), 629.
64.
Bonora, Chronica civitatis Placentiae, 59.
65.
Sorbelli, Corpus Chronicorum Bononiensium, vol. 4, cronaca A: 368, cronaca B: 369; Bonora, Chronica civitatis Placentiae, 60.
66.
Jan Dabrowski, ed., Ioannis Dlugossii Annales seu cronicae incliti regni Poloniae, vol. 12 [2], 1462–1480 (Krákow: Polska Akademia Umiejetności, 2005), 220.
67.
[Franz] Wachter, ed., “Chronicalische Aufzeichnungen zur Geschichte der Stadt Halle vom Jahre 1464–1512,” Neue Mitteilungen aus dem Gebiete historisch-antiquarischer Forschungen 15 (1882): 97.
68.
Rudolf Brázdil et al., “European Floods During the Winter 1783/1784: Scenarios of an Extreme Event During the ‘Little Ice Age,’” Theoretical and Applied Climatology 100, no. 1–2 (2010): 163–189.
69.
Emmanuel Le Roy Ladurie, Histoire humaine et comparée du climat, vol. 1, Canicules et glaciers; XIIIe–XVIIIe siècles (Paris: Fayard 2004), 275–279, 544–558 and passim; Emmanuel Le Roy Ladurie and Micheline Baulant, “Grape Harvests from the Fifteenth Through the Nineteenth Centuries,” The Journal of Interdisciplinary History 10 (1980): 839–849.
70.
Dierauer, Chronik der Stadt Zürich, 198–199.
71.
Joachim von Watt (Vadian), Die Größere Chronik der Äbte: Abtei und Stadt St. Gallen im Hoch- und Spätmittelalter (1199–1491) aus reformatorischer Sicht, vol. 2, 1442–1491, ed. Bernd Stettler, St. Galler Kultur und Geschichte 36 (Zürich: Chronos, 2010), 587; Jacques du Clercq, Mémoires: 1448–67. vol. 4, ed. Frédéric de Reiffenberg (Bruxelles: Arnold Lacrosse, 1823), 299.
72.
Bernard de Mandrot, ed., Journal de Jean de Roye, connu sous le nom de Chronique Scandaleuse, vol. 2, 1460–1483, Ouvrages publiés par la Société de l’histoire de France 85 (Paris 1894), 103.
73.
Clercq, Memoires, 299; Reiche, Chronik Hartung Cammermeisters, 217.
74.
Bonora, Chronica civitatis Placentiae, 59; Sorbelli, Corpus Chronicorum Bononiensium, vol. 4, cronaca A: 352, cronaca B: 352–353.
75.
Reiche, Chronik Hartung Cammermeisters, 221.
76.
Magdeburger Schöppenchronik, 410–411.
77.
Wilhelm Engel, ed., Die Rats-Chronik der Stadt Würzburg: (XV. und XVI. Jahrhundert), Quellen und Forschungen zur Geschichte des Bistums und Hochstifts Würzburg 2 (Würzburg: Schöningh, 1950), 32.
78.
Ghirardacci, Della Historia di Bologna, 202.
79.
Sorbelli, Corpus Chronicorum Bononiensium, vol. 4, cronaca A: 389, cronaca B: 389.
80.
Engel, Rats-Chronik der Stadt Würzburg, 33.
81.
Luciano Palermo, “Carestie e cronisti nel Trecento: Roma e Firenze nel racconto dell’Anonimo e di Giovanni Villani,” Archivio storico italiano 142 (1984): 343–375.
82.
Sorbelli, Corpus Chronicorum Bononiensium, vol. 4, cronaca A: 347; Ghirardacci, Della Historia di Bologna, 189.
83.
Sergio Tonetti, “Problemi di vettovagliamento cittadino e misure di politica annonaria a Firenze nel XV secolo (1430–1500),” Archivio storico italiano 157 (1999): 434–436.
84.
Giuseppe Brizzolare, ed., La cronaca di Cristoforo da Soldo, Rerum Italicarum Scriptores 21/3 (Bologna: Zanichelli, 1938–1942), 147–148.
85.
Clercq, Memoires, 299.
86.
Ibid.; Hieronymus de Bursellis, “Annales Bononienses (1418–1497),” in Rerum italicarum scriptores ab anno aerae Christanae 500 ad 1500, vol. 23, ed. Lodovico Antonio Muratori (Milano: Societas Palatinae, 1733), col. 896.
87.
Leibniz, “Chronica S. Aegidii in Brunswig,” 598.
88.
Magdeburger Schöppenchronik, 410–411.
89.
Cordes, Goslarer Chronik, 114; Chroniken der westfälischen und niederrheinischen Städte, 51; Reiche, Chronik Hartung Cammermeisters, 221.
90.
Leibniz, Chronicon Brunsvicensium Picturatum, 412.
91.
Michele Canensi, “De Vita et Pontificatu Pauli Secundi,” in Le vite di Paolo II, di Gaspare da Verona e Michele Canensi, ed. Giuseppe Zippel, Rerum Italicarum scriptores 3/16 (Città di Castello: Lapi, 1904), 98–99; Luciano Palermo, “L’approvvigionamento granario della capitale,” in Roma capitale (1447–1527), ed. Sergio Gensini (Pisa: Pacini, 1994), 145–205.
92.
Ghirardacci, Della Historia di Bologna, 202.
93.
George Boustronios, A Narrative of the Chronicle of Cyprus, 1456–89, trans. and ed. Nicholas Coureas, Sources for the History of Cyprus 13 (Nicosia: Cyprus Research Center, 2005), 114. The translation of the Greek μύρτος as blight is disputable.
94.
Amy Gray Jones, “Defining Catastrophe: Mass Burial at St Mary Spital,” in A Bioarchaeological Study of Medieval Burials on the Site of St Mary Spital; Excavations at Spitalfields Market, London E1; 1991–2007, ed. Brian Connell et al. (London: Museum of London Archaeology, 2012), 228–231.
95.
Maternus Berler, “Chronik,” in Code historique et diplomatique de la ville de Strasbourg, vol. 1,1/2 (Strasbourg: Silbermann, 1843), 73.
96.
Philippe de Vigneulle, “Chroniques de Metz,” 344.
97.
[Michael Czacheritz], Cronica monasterii canonicorum regularium (s. Augustini) in Glacz, ed. Wojciech Mrozowicz (Wrocław: Universitas Wratislaviensis. Inst. Studiorum Silesiacorum et Bohemicorum, 2003), 178.
98.
Sorbelli, Corpus Chronicorum Bononiensium, vol. 4, cronaca A: 341.
99.
Samuel K. Cohn Jr., “The Black Death: End of a Paradigm,” The American Historical Review 107, (2002): 703–736; Klaus Bergdolt, Der Schwarze Tod in Europa: Die Große Pest und das Ende des Mittelalters, 5th ed. (München: Beck, 2003), 17–20.
100.
Philippe de Vigneulle, “Chroniques de Metz,” 351–353.
101.
Ibid., 351; Michelant, Chronique de Metz de Jacomin Husson, 101.
102.
Sorbelli, Corpus Chronicorum Bononiensium, vol. 4, cronaca A: 352, cronaca B: 352–353.
103.
Markgraf, ed., Annales Glogovienses, 22.
104.
Dabrowski, Ioannis Dlugossii Annales, 176, 205.
105.
Philippides, George Sphrantzes, 89.
106.
Gassar, Annales Augstburgenses, 1664.
107.
Sorbelli, Corpus Chronicorum Bononiensium, vol. 4, cronaca A: 369, cronaca B: 370.
108.
Chroniken der westfälischen und niederrheinischen Städte, 51.
109.
Johannes Schiphower, “Chronicon Archicomitum Oldenburgensium,” in Scriptores Germanicos, Scriptores Rerum Germanicarum 2, ed. Heinrich Meibom (Helmstedt: Hamm, 1688), 182–183. The fact that this is reported by a North German source focused on the archbishops and dukes of Oldenburg substantially diminishes its credibility, though the author studied in Bologna and Siena in the 1480s and might therefore have had access to local witnesses. Encyclopedia of the Medieval Chronicle, s.v. “Schiphower, Johannes;” Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (München: Duncker & Humblot, 1890), s.v. “Schiphower, Johannes.” An Italian source confirms the severity of the epidemic in Parma, mentioning that grass grew on the city’s main piazza. Giovanni Cornazzano, Historiae Parmensis fragmenta: Additamenta recentiores scriptoris, Rerum Italicarum scriptores 12, ed. Ludovico Antonio Muratori (Milano: Societas Palatina, 1728), col. 752.
110.
“Liber novarum provisionum” [1400-1470], fol. 410.
111.
Canensi, “De Vita et Pontificatu Pauli Secundi,” 98–99n2.
112.
Cabanes Pecourt, Dietari del capellá, 271.
113.
Benedetto Dei, La Cronica dell’ anno 1400 all’ anno 1500, ed. Roberto Barducci, Fonti e studi/Istituto per la Storia degli Antichi Stati Italiani 1 (Firenze: Papafava, 1985), 166–167.
114.
Boustronios, A Narrative of the Chronicle of Cyprus, 114. For other meteorological events in the 1460s see Gilles Grivaud, “Pour une histoire des villages désertes a Chypre de la fin du XIIe à la fin du XIXe siècle” (PhD diss., École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales, Paris, 1994), 434–437.
115.
Brazdil and Pfister, “Historical Climatology in Europe,” 403.
116.
Lindau, Geschichte des 13j€ahrigen Krieges, 619. “See on the influence of weather on military actions in this region for earlier times: Marie-Luise Heckmann, Krieg und Wetter – in erzählenden Quellen PreuÔens und Livlands im 13. und 14. Jahrhundert, in: Roman Czaja and Krzysztof Kopiński, eds., Piśmienność pragmatyczna – edytorstwo źródeł historycznych – archiwistika. Studia ofiarowane Profesorowi Januszowi Tandeckiemu w sześćdziesiąta oiąta rocznicȩ urodzin, Roman Czaja und Krzysztof Kopiński (Toruń: TNT, 2015), 191–212”.
117.
Sorbelli, Corpus Chronicorum Bononiensium, vol. 4, cronaca A: 388.
118.
Leone Cobelli, Cronache forlivesi dalla fondazione della città all’ anno 1498, ed. Giosuè Carducci and Enrico Frati, vol. 1, Dei Monumenti istorici pertinenti alle provincie della Romagna 3 (Bologna: Regia tipografia, 1874), 252–254.
119.
Sorbelli, Corpus Chronicorum Bononiensium, vol. 4, cronaca A: 341, cronaca B: 341.
120.
He served as a preacher at the Florentine cathedral from 1464: Rosa Maria Dessì, ed., Ecritures laïques, prédication et confréries à Florence au XVe siècle: A propos du ms. Riccardiano 2894 [1451–1466] (Paris 1993), 357.
121.
Ibid., see page 15 of Dessì's edition of the source.
122.
“Predighone sopra ai giudizi aspetta l’Italia pe‘ suoi pechati: e sì dal Turcho e fame e peste e grande amplitudine d’aqua, che à grande paura non si achonzi il mar di Vinegia con quello di Gienova e somerghando tutta Italia.” Ibid., 347.
123.
Previous research and the editor of the text saw the disasters in a more general apocalyptic context. Ibid., 191–192.
124.
Ibid., see page 348 of Dessì's edition of the source. An almost similar conjunction of Saturn, Jupiter, and Mars with comparable consequences [“guerres, mortalité, faulte de biens, et plusieurs aultres maulx”] is reported by a French source for 1464: Clercq, Memoires, 113.
125.
“Annales Mellicensis,” 521. For the connection between nature and religion see Gerrit J. Schenk, “Lektüren im Buch der Natur: Wahrnehmung, Beschreibung und Deutung von Naturkatastrophen,” in Geschichte schreiben: Ein Quellen- und Studienbuch zur Historiographie (ca. 1350–1750), ed. Susanne Rau and Birgit Studt (Berlin: Akademie-Verlag, 2009), 507–520.
126.
Soranzo, Cronaca di Anonimo Veronese, 227.
127.
As in the case of the Byzantine chronicler (see annotation 188), a solar or lunar eclipse was quickly dismissed as an explanation: “Alcuni veduto tal novità nel sole dissero eclipsato el sole per la interposition de la terra, altri la luna interposita tra el sole e noi, che facilmente tal opinion si getta a terra, quum sit che nullo eclipse naturaliter possi durare più de 3 hore o circa.” (Soranzo, Cronaca di Anonimo Veronese, 227). And there were several ‘meteorological-geophysical’ approaches, too: “molti altri forono, che volevano tale offuschatione essere processa da vapori ellevati da la terra, prima dissichata per la extrema secha de la estate et poi apresso per la exuberante moltitudine de piogie, che abundaro subito ne lo autonno; altri volsero che fusse vapori grossi, vischiosi, humidi, ellevati fino a la megia region del aire etc.; altri de altra opinion, dicendo molte estate per adrieto essere state più seche che la preterita et per consequens autumni più humidi ch’el presente, unde magior copia de vapori naturaliter doveriano esser concreati et successive fatto qualche segno, che minime s’è veduto.” (Soranzo, Cronaca di Anonimo Veronese, 227).
128.
The author of this paper tried to do so here: Martin Bauch, Der Regen, das Korn und das Salz: die Madonna di San Luca und das Wettermirakel von 1433. Eine klimahistorische Fallstudie zu Bologna und Italien in den 1430er Jahren, in Quellen und Forschungen aus italienischen Archiven und Bibliotheken 95 (2015), 188–217; for the larger context of this event see: Chantal Camenisch et al., The 1430s: a cold period of extraordinary internal climate variability during the early Spörer Minimum with social and economic impacts in north-western and central Europe, in Climate of the Past 12 (2016), 2107–2126, doi:10.5194/cp-12-2107-2016.
129.
Ghirardacci, Della Historia di Bologna, 189.
130.
Philippe de Vigneulle, “Chroniques de Metz,” 351–355.
131.
Ibid., 356.
132.
Tummulillis, Notabilia temporum, 138; Soranzo, Cronaca di Anonimo Veronese, 227.
133.
Reiche, ed., Chronik Hartung Cammermeisters, 219.
134.
Sorbelli, Corpus Chronicorum Bononiensium, vol. 4, cronaca A: 378, cronaca B: 378.
135.
Tummulillis, Notabilia temporum, 123.
136.
Ghirardacci, Della Historia di Bologna, 178, 182.
137.
Tommaso Fecini, Cronaca senese, 1431–1479, ed. Alessandro Lessini and Fabio Iacometti, Rerum Italicarum scriptores 15/6 (Bologna: Zanichelli, 1947), 869.
138.
Cabanes Pecourt, Dietari del capellá, 259.
139.
“Chronica latina Sabaudiae,” in Historiae patriae monumenta, vol. 3, ed. D. Promis (Torino: Reg. Typograph, 1840), col. 631. Christian Speer, ed., Die lateinische Chronik (1131–1484) des Görlitzer Altaristen Stephan Furmann [† 1503]. Edition – Kommentar – ergänzende Quellen, in: Thomas Binder, ed., 666 Jahre Sechsstädtebund, Veröffentlichungen aus dem Stadtarchiv Kamenz 1, (Görlitz/Zittau: Oettel, 2012, 39–84, here 64. [John Warkworth], “Warkworth’s Chronicle,” in Death and Dissent: Two Fifteenth Century Chronicles, ed. Lister M. Matheson (Woodbridge: Boydell Press, 1999), 94.
140.
Reiche, Chronik Hartung Cammermeisters, 208; Rosicz, “Gesta diversa,” 81; “Chronijcke van Nederlant van den jaere 1027 tot den jaere 1565,” in Chroniques de Brabant et de Flandre, ed. Charles Piot, Collection de chroniques belges inédites 21 (Bruxelles: Lamertin, 1879), 79.
141.
Carducci and Frati, Cronache forlivesi, 247.
142.
Allegretti, “Ephemerides Senenses,” 771; Giovanni di Pedrino, Cronica del suo tempo, vol. 2, 1437–1464, ed. Gino Borghezio and Marco Vattasso (Roma: Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana), 405–406; Fecini, Cronaca senese, 870.
143.
Giovan Francesco Rebaccini, La piu antica cronaca di Cuneo, ed. Piero Camilla, Biblioteca della Società per gli Studi Storici, Archeologici ed Artistici della provincia di Cuneo 16 (Cuneo, 1981), 177; Ghirardacci, Della Historia di Bologna, 182.
144.
A. Sagredo, ed., “Annali veneti dall‘ anno 1457 al 1500 del Senatore Domenico Malipiero,” Archivio Storico Italiano 1, no. 7 (1843–47): 34–35; Pedrino, Cronica del suo tempo, 410–411.
145.
“Compilatio de gestis Britonum et Anglorum (1429–1471),” in Three Fifteenth-Century Chronicles, ed. James Gairdner, The Royal Historical Society. Publications 28, (Westminster: The Camden Society, 1880), 180.
146.
Clercq, Memoires, 90–91.
147.
Ghirardacci, Della Historia di Bologna, 187. It is hard to say whether this can be connected to the celestial phenomena reported from the Maastricht area. “Van Reyde. Inden joer ons lyeffs Heren MCCCC inde LXIIIJ, off in diessen worden is der datum off joere vurs, ouch te veynden: HOC SIGNVM CRVCIS ERIT IN CELO:” See Habets, Chronijck der Landen van Overmaas, 203.
148.
Sorbelli, Corpus Chronicorum Bononiensium, vol. 4, cronaca A: 369, cronaca B: 370.
149.
Habets, Chronijck der Landen van Overmaas, 19; Leibniz, Chronica S. Aegidii, 597. In Bologna the ‘fevers’ mainly killed old people and were attributed by the chronicler to the cold winter: Ghirardacci, Della Historia di Bologna, 178.
150.
“Erfurt. Von 1365 bis 1525,” Anzeiger für Kunde des deutschen Mittelalters 3 (1834): 231; Diario Ferrarese dall‘ anno 1409 sino al 1502, ed. Giuseppe Pardi, Rerum Italicarum Scriptores 24/7 (Bologna: Zanichelli, 1933), 45.
151.
Die Chroniken der niedersächsischen Städte: Lübeck, vol. 4, XVIII. Die Ratschronik von 1438–1482: Dritte Fortsetzung der Detmar-Chronik zweiter Teil, vol. 1, 1438–1465, Die Chroniken der deutschen Städte 30 (Leipzig: Hirzel, 1910), 360–362.
152.
“Joannis Staindelii Presbyteri Pataviensis Chronicon Generale ab O.C. ad A.C. MDVIII,” in Rerum boicarum scriptores, vol. 1, ed. Andreas Felix von Oefele (Augsburg: Veith, 1763), 538; “Hans Kirchmeier: Münchener Annalen (1453–1483),” in Beyträge zur vaterländischen Historie, Geographie, Statistik und Landwirtschaft, ed. Lorenz von Westenrieder, vol. 5 (München: Lindauer, 1794), 195.
153.
“V. Chronik des Hector Mülich 1348–1487,” in Die Chroniken der schwäbischen Städte: Augsburg, vol. 3, Chroniken der deutschen Städte 22 (Leipzig: Hirzel, 1892), 197–198; Die Chroniken der schwäbischen Städte: Augsburg, vol. 2, IV. Chronik des Burkard Zink 1368–1468, Die Chroniken der deutschen Städte 5 (Leipzig: Hirzel, 1866), 293–294; “Die Chronik Erhards von Appenwiler,” 344.
154.
Leibniz, Chronicon Brunsvicensium Picturatum, 411.
155.
“Cronica brevis (lipsiensem dixeris) de quibusdam novissimis temporibus actis in partibus Missne et Thuringie,” in Rerum germanicarum scriptores, vol. 3, ed. Johann Burkhard Mencken (Leipzig: Martinus, 1730), col. 61; [Johannes von Guben], “Jahrbuecher des Zittauischen Stadtschreibers Johannes von Guben und einiger seiner Amtsnachfolger,” in Scriptores rerum Lusaticarum: Neue Folge, vol. 1 (Görlitz, 1839), 82.
156.
Reiche, Chronik Hartung Cammermeisters, 208; Leonhard Drechsler, “Chronicon Salisburgense (1452–1495),” in Scriptores rerum austriacarum, vol. 2, ed. Heinrich Pez (Leipzig: Gleditsch, 1725), 431.
157.
„Jahrbuecher des Zittauischen Stadtschreibers,“ 82.
158.
Markgraf, Annales Glogovienses, 22; Rosicz, “Gesta diversa,” 81; “Ein kort Uttoch der Wendeschen Chronicon von 801–1535,” in Hamburgische Chroniken in niedersächsischer Sprache, ed. Johann Martin Lappenberg (Hamburg: Perthes & Mauke, 1861), 257; almost the same wording in “Hamburger Chronik von 799–1559,” ibid., 410.
159.
“Bern Gyseke’s Chronik von 810–1542,” in Lappenberg, Hamburgische Chroniken, 40; almost the same wording in “Hamburger Chronik von 799–1559,” ibid., 409; Theodor Hirsch and Friedrich August Vossberg, ed., Caspar Weinreichs Danziger Chronik: Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte Danzigs, der Lande Preussen und Polen, des Hansabundes und der nordischen Reiche (Berlin: Stargard, 1855), 2.
160.
At the end of June 1464, Cologne wrote to Lubeck and Hamburg about the ‘great mortality’ in Hamburg and what to do about the forthcoming Hanseatic diet. Lubeck finally proposed to postpone it by a year “in hope that God will end the pestilence until then.” Verein für hansische Geschichte, ed., Hanserecesse: Von 1431–1476, Abt. 2, Vol. 5 (Leipzig: Duncker & Humblot, 1888), nos. 564, 567, 568.
161.
Rudolf Baier, ed., Zwei stralsundische Chroniken des fünfzehnten Jahrhunderts (Stralsund: Königliche Regierungs-Buchdruckerei, 1893), 38; Gottlieb Mohnike and Ernst Heinrich Zober, ed., Eine alte Stralsunder Chronik: Aus der unlängst aufgefundenen Pergamenthandschrift (Stralsund: Löffler 1842), 210.
162.
“Mittlere Chronik von Oliva,” in Scriptores rerum prussicarum: Die Geschichtquellen der preußischen Vorzeit bis zum Untergange der Ordensherrschaft, vol. 5, ed. Theodor Hirsch, Max Toeppen, and Ernst Strehlke (Leipzig: Hirzel, 1874), 633; Ernst Strehlke, ed., “Franciscani Thorunensis Annales Prussici (941–1410) u. Fortsetzung der Thorner Annalisten,” in Hirsch, Toeppen, and Strehlke, Scriptores rerum prussicarum: Die Geschichtquellen der preußischen Vorzeit bis zum Untergange der Ordensherrschaft, vol. 3 (Leipzig: Hirzel, 1866) 399.
163.
Claes Gejrot, ed., Diarium Vadstenense: The Memorial Book of Vadstena Abbey; A Critical Edition with an Introduction, Acta Universitatis Stockholmiensis: Studia Latina Stockholmiensis 33 (Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell, 1988), 252.
164.
Die Ratschronik von 1438–1482, 361–362.
165.
Reiche, Chronik Hartung Cammermeisters, 208; Chronik des Burkard Zink, 293.
166.
Carducci and Frati, Cronache forlivesi, 252; Ghirardacci, Della Historia di Bologna, 187.
167.
Pedrino, Cronica del suo tempo, 366.
168.
Rosicz, “Gesta diversa,” 79.
169.
Mackay, “Climate and Popular Unrest in Late Medieval Castille,” 368.
170.
“I. Chronik des Johann Kerkhörde von 1405-1463 [Dortmund],” in Die Chroniken der westfälischen und niederrheinischen Städte, vol. 1, Dortmund, Neuß, Die Chroniken der deutschen Städte 20 (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1969), 141.
171.
Lindau, Geschichte des 13jährigen Krieges, 598.
172.
[Czacheritz], Cronica monasterii canonicorum regularium, 176.
173.
Ghirardacci, Della Historia di Bologna, 182.
174.
Rosicz, “Gesta diversa,” 80.
175.
Jürgen Wolf, “Die ‘Augsburger Stadt-Weltchronik’ Konrad Bollstatters: Untersuchung und Edition,” Zeitschrift des Historischen Vereins für Schwaben und Neuburg 87 (1995): 13–38; Paul Joachimson, “Zur städtischen und klösterlichen Geschichtsschreibung Augsburgs im 15. Jahrhundert,” Alemannia 22 (1894): 153; For corroboration, though the two sources may not have been independent, see Anton Steichele ed., “Fr. Johannes Frank’s Augsburger Annalen, 1430–1462,” Archiv für die Geschichte des Bisthums Augsburg 2 (1859): 116.
176.
For the Early and High Middle Ages it seems to be far less frequent. Isabelle Draelants does not mention a single event of the kind for her regional study covering today’s Belgium, but this might be due to the lack of systematic studies of celestial phenomena for the whole of Early and High Medieval Europe: Draelants, Éclipses, comètes, autres phénomènes, 109–140.
177.
The description of the putative volcanic dust veil is given in detail and most clearly by Richer of Senones, see Richer of Senones, “Richeri Gesta Senoniensis Ecclesiae,” ed. Georg Waitz, in [Gesta saec. XIII], Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Scriptores 25 (Hannover: Hahn, 1880), 333. For more about this event see Franck Lavigne et al., “Source of the great A.D. 1257 mystery eruption unveiled, Samalas volcano, Rinjani Volcanic Complex, Indonesia”, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 110/42 (2013): 16742–16747; Richard B. Stothers, “Climatic and Demographic Consequences of the Massive Volcanic Eruption of 1258,” Climatic Change 45 (2000): 361–374.
178.
A chronicle of Mainz reports these phenomena from 24 June to 8 September 1359. See “VI. Chronicon Moguntinum (1347–1406),” in Die Chroniken der mittelrheinischen Städte: Mainz, vol. 2, Chroniken der deutschen Städte 18 (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1968), 162–163.
179.
Tummulillis, Notabilia temporum, 55.
180.
Bursellis, “Annales Bononienses,” 892.
181.
The sun lost its glow in June 1488, which was a lean year altogether. A warm March was followed by a permanently cold summer. The chilly temperatures in summer and autumn ruined wine and vineyards alike. Konrad Stolle, Memoriale: Thüringisch-erfurtische Chronik, ed. Richard Thiele, Geschichtsquellen der Provinz Sachsen und angrenzender Gebiete 39 (Halle/Saale: Hendel, 1900), 441–442.
182.
Wolfgang Harms and Michael Schilling, eds., Die Sammlung der Zentralbibliothek Zürich: Kommentierte Ausgabe, vol. 1, Die Wickiana (1500–1569), Deutsche illustrierte Flugblätter des 16. Jahrhunderts 6 (Tübingen: Niemeyer, 2005), 299.
183.
Franz Mauelshagen, Wunderkammer auf Papier: Die „Wickiana“ zwischen Reformation und Volksglaube, Frühneuzeit-Forschungen 15 (Epfendorf: Bibliotheca Academica, 2011), 357–359. The factuality of the miraculous signs has not been tested by looking for confirmation from other sources.
184.
Ibid. A special search for the descriptions of aurorae borealis has been done within the Wickiana, but stainings of the sun are not discussed, see Wiebke Schwarte, Nordlichter: Ihre Darstellung in der Wickiana (Münster: Waxmann, 1999).
185.
Barbara Bauer, “Die Krise der Reformation: Johann Jacob Wicks Chronik aussergewöhnlicher Natur- und Himmelserscheinungen,” in Wahrnehmungsgeschichte und Wissensdiskurs im illustrierten Flugblatt der Frühen Neuzeit (1450–1700), ed. Wolfgang Harms and Alfred Messerli (Basel: Schwabe, 2002), 193–236. The example analysis of single phenomena is not dedicated to stainings or halos of the sun. Ibid., 211–234.
186.
First, we will not find sulphuric acid peaks in polar ice cores for each date indicated by the written sources. Michael Sigl et al., “A New Bipolar Ice Record of Volcanism from WAIS Divide and NEEM and Implications for Climate Forcing of the Last 2000 Years,” Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres 118, no. 3 (2013): 8–9, table 1158–1160. Second, there might be eruptions that did not leave a sulphur signal in polar ice cores. D. M. Pyle, “Ice-Core Acidity Peaks, Retarded Tree Growth and Putative Eruptions,” Archaeometry 31, no. 1 (1989): 88–91.
187.
Rudolf Penndorf, On the Phenomenon of the Colored Sun, Especially the “Blue” Sun of September 1950 (Cambridge, MA: Air Force Cambridge Research Center, 1953).
188.
German translation of the Greek text in: Diether Roderich Reinsch, ed., Mehmet II. erobert Konstantinopel: Die ersten Regierungsjahre des Sultans Mehmet Fatih, des Eroberers von Konstantinopel 1453; Das Geschichtswerk des Kritobulos von Imbros, Byzantinische Geschichtsschreiber 17 (Graz: Styria, 1986), 277.
189.
No results were found in Kristine Chalyan-Daffner, Natural disasters in Mamluk Egypt (1250–1517): Perceptions, interpretations and human responses, Heidelberg 2013; online: http://archiv.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/volltextserver/17711/ and Heinz Grotzfeld, Arabic Documentary Data Collection (800–1100, 1300–1821), integrated into the database www.tambora.org in 2009.
190.
„Und in dem selben (Jahre) trockneten die Pflanzen durch Sonnenhitze aus oder regnete es Sommerfeuer. Niemand säte infolge der Sturmwinde. Alte Bäume wurden vernichtet.“ Walter Lehmann and Gerdt Kutscher, eds., Das Memorial Breve Acerca de la fundacion de la ciudad de Culhuacan, Quellenwerke zur alten Geschichte Amerikas aufgezeichnet in der Sprache der Eingeborenen 7 (Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1958), 164. The stormy weather is confirmed in Walter Lehmann, ed., Die Geschichte der Königreiche von Colhuacan und Mexico, Quellenwerke zur alten Geschichte Amerikas aufgezeichnet in der Sprache der Eingeborenen 1 (Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1938), 258.
191.
De’er Zhang, ed., A Compendium of Chinese Meteorological Records of the Last 3,000 Years, vol. 2 (Nanjing: Phoenix Publishing Network, 2004). Relevant is here vol. 2 with information for the Ming Dynasty (1368–1643).
192.
Ibid., 697–720. I have to thank Prof. Mao Zhengwei (Hangzhou) for his indispensable help and Xiangyu Kong (Hangzhou) for his splendid translation.
193.
1460: 55 % floods, 14 % droughts, 18 % continuous rainfall. 1461: 38 % floods, 29 % continuous rainfall, 22 % droughts. 1462: 35 % floods, 6 % continuous rainfall, 32 % droughts, no snow 16 %. 1463: 33 % floods, 29 % continuous rainfall, 33 % droughts.
194.
1464: 42 % floods, 17 % continuous rainfall, 6 % droughts.
195.
“February 17^th, there was great fog.” De’er, A Compendium of Chinese Meteorological Records, 705.
196.
Xiangfan (renamed Xiangyang in 2010), Province Hubei: “Black balls like millets fell in Xiangyang.” Shunde, today part of the city of Foshan, Province Guangdong: “In the 6th month of summer [5 July – 2 August 1464], black rice fell in Shunde.” De’er, A Compendium of Chinese Meteorological Records, 710.
197.
1466: 43 % floods, 27 % droughts. 1467: 36 % floods, 60 % droughts. 1468: 26 % floods, 53 % droughts. 1469: 62 % floods, 20 % droughts.
198.
Zhuji Country, part of the City of Shaoxing, Zheijang Province: “In winter, the peach and plum flowered.” De’er, A Compendium of Chinese Meteorological Records, 714.
199.
Tongxu County, part of Kaifeng area: “Fog in the 5th month [22 May−19 June 1468] resulted in the death of crops. In autumn, there was continuous excessive rainfall, rice rotted.” De’er, A Compendium of Chinese Meteorological Records, 718.
200.
Beijing City: “The winter was hot like summer.” Ibid.
201.
William S. Atwell, “Volcanism and Short-Term Climatic Change in East Asian and World History, c. 1200–1699,” Journal of World History 12 (2001): 50–55.
202.
Sigl et al., “A New Bipolar Ice Record,” 10–13; C. T. Plummer et al., “An Independently Dated 2000-yr Volcanic Record from Law Dome, East Antarctica, Including a New Perspective on the Dating of the c. 1450s Eruption of Kuwae,Vanuatu,” Climate of the Past 8, no. 6 (2012): 1929–1940.
203.
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204.
Boucheron, “Introduction. Les boucles du monde,” 9–11.

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Deutsches Historisches Institut Rom, Rome, Italy
Martin Bauch

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Martin Bauch
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Fachgebiet Mittelalterliche Geschichte, Institut für Geschichte, Darmstadt, Germany
Gerrit Jasper Schenk

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Bauch, M. (2017). The Day the Sun Turned Blue: A Volcanic Eruption in the Early 1460s and Its Possible Climatic Impact—A Natural Disaster Perceived Globally in the Late Middle Ages?. In: Schenk, G. (eds) Historical Disaster Experiences. Transcultural Research – Heidelberg Studies on Asia and Europe in a Global Context. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-49163-9_6

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-49163-9_6
Published: 21 March 2017
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Print ISBN: 978-3-319-49162-2
Online ISBN: 978-3-319-49163-9
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