Science, society and environmental change in the first millennium CE

Rationale: Previous studies, especially in humanities, have tended to focus on rural agricultural societies, landscape-management and effects of changing technologies. This project instead explores how people thought about and responded to natural phenomena and environmental change in the first millennium CE. It will investigate intellectual and social responses to the natural world, contextualised within research into past environmental/climate change and major events (e.g. volcanic eruptions, flooding,warming/cooling periods). Using case-studies, participants will explore how different societies, communities and individuals responded to phenomena such as floods, comets, volcanic eruptions and epidemics.

Project aims: The project aims to explore similarities and differences in responses, and to contextualise them within known, scientifically-documented largescale climate change along with smaller-scale (often local or regional) environmental fluctuation. These discussions will lay the ground for more intensive future research combining approaches from multiple disciplines. By bringing together scholars of sciences, social sciences and humanities, the project aims to suggest new questions and approaches for future research, utilising the expertise of multiple disciplines together.

Fellows: 

• Dr Anna Jones, Edge Hill University
• Dr Caroline Petit, University of Warwick