After the era of the migration of peoples in Europe in the 10th century, warming again sets in, lasting about three hundred years. However, at the beginning of the XIV century, the course of the warm Gulf Stream slows down, which leads to a real environmental disaster - unusually heavy rains begin, winters become severe, which leads to the freezing of gardens and the death of crops.

Fruit trees have completely died out in England, Scotland, northern France and Germany. In Germany and Scotland, all vineyards were frozen, which led to the cessation of the tradition of winemaking. Snow began to fall in Italy, and severe frosts led to mass starvation. Medieval legends tell that in England of the XIV century, due to rains and storms, two mythical islands are completely hidden under water. In Russia, the cooling process was reflected in atypically rainy years.

Scientists tend to call this period, which lasted from the 14th to the 19th centuries, the Little Ice Age, since the average annual temperature at that time was the lowest in two thousand years. Despite the fact that temperatures began to rise at the end of the 14th century, the Ice Age did not end there. Snowfalls and frosts continued, although the famine associated with a small harvest had already ended.

Snow-covered Central Europe became commonplace, and glaciers began to advance in Greenland, permafrost settled in the region. Some researchers attribute the slight warming characteristic of the 15th-16th centuries to the fact that the maximum solar activity of that time compensated for the slowdown of the Gulf Stream, raising the average annual temperature.

However, the coldest time of the Little Ice Age was the third stage of cooling - solar activity decreased sharply, which led to the disappearance of the Vikings from Greenland, covering even the southern seas with ice. A sharp change in temperature allowed people to freely ride on the Thames, the Danube and the Moscow River. In Paris, Berlin and London, blizzards and snowfalls, blizzards and drifts have become commonplace. This period was the coldest in recent history Europe, but in the 19th century temperatures gradually began to rise, and today the world is in a phase of natural warming, in a state of exit from the Little Ice Age, as some researchers think.

Therefore, it is not surprising that in many large cities in Europe, for example, in Prague, unexpected floods occur, and the average annual temperature in the world is steadily rising. According to the theory of climatologists, a climatic optimum should soon follow, which will return the world to the climatic state of the 10th century.

I am starting to publish my popular science article on the Little Ice Age in Western Europe and Russia.

In the history of Europe during the last millennium, the Little Ice Age was a notable event with great social consequences. The reasons for it, of course, were not understood by contemporaries and are being studied only today - if only for the sake of the fact that all climatic deviations have the property of repeating themselves. In order not to be taken by surprise, you need to know more about this. The connection between natural and social events, characteristic of the Little Ice Age, seems to have lost its relevance. But this is only at first glance. It is instructive, and can shed light not only on events Russian history 16-17 centuries, but even in our time. But first things first.

Little Ice Age in Europe.

The Little Ice Age is a global cooling that began in the middle of the 16th century (the first notable event in Western Europe was a very severe winter of 1564-1565) and continued until the middle of the 19th. Sometimes, however, the first cold blows of the middle of the 15th century, and even earlier events, are attributed to it. Currently, there are several temperature reconstructions that could illustrate the climatic changes of that time. But we will take an assessment that reflects them indirectly, through changes in the biosphere. These are variations in tree ring thickness from 14 locations in the Northern Hemisphere (Figure 1).

Rice. 1. Standardized tree ring thickness in the Northern Hemisphere 1500-1990.

It is clearly seen that from the beginning of the 16th century to its end, the thickness of the tree rings decreased by a whole third! This is evidence of a strong climate change. The changes, of course, did not only occur with trees, but they affected a sharp decrease in yields. From the 1560s to the end of the century, wheat prices in Europe rose 3-4 times everywhere. On the one hand, Spain was to blame - it "overproduced" silver, but, as can be seen from the prices of manufactured goods, this contributed to a rise in prices by 60-80%. Prices for plant products were determined primarily by climate change.

For agrarian societies, this was a long ordeal. After a very difficult period in the middle XVI – first third of XVII century, the climate remained unstable for another two centuries. There were several more severe cold snaps - the last of them occurred in the first half of XIX century and caused famine and a wave of emigration from Germany, Ireland and Scandinavia to America. And this at a time when the potato had already spread in Europe, causing a long-term growth of its population.

If we return to the beginning of the Little Ice Age, then its arrival is well described by the change in the purchasing power of Europeans. For example, here is how the purchasing power of a skilled European carpenter (Figure 2) changed, measured in liters of grain or in the number of chickens that could be bathed for a week's earnings.

Rice. 2. Change in the purchasing power of the master carpenter XIV - first half XVIII century .

Both scales, of course, are connected - chickens are fed with grain. Proportions are connected among themselves and the prices of other agricultural products. From them it follows that the standard of living of a European artisan fell from the middle of the 15th to the middle-end of the 16th century by 4-5 times. More precisely, the fall happened faster - in one or two decades. Most of Europe has become much worse to eat. According to archaeologists, the average height of a mature man in Northern Europe from the 15th-16th centuries to the 17th-18th centuries decreased by almost 4 cm - from 171.4 cm to 167.5 cm. And again it began to recover only in the 19th century. And we must also take into account that more severe winters required more fuel, for which Europe was not rich, and, as a result, a weakening of the population and a number of epidemics.

When the climate changes, the number of its long and sharp deviations increases, leading to crop failures. Western Europe suffered a series of mass hunger strikes in the 1590s, 1620s and at the turn of the 17th and 18th centuries. Added to this is the famine in individual countries. The northern countries suffered more - the Danish settlements in Greenland died out, the population of Iceland decreased by half, in Scandinavia, where there were also crop failures and famine, the population found salvation in the sea industry. Frosts destroyed vineyards in England, Poland, northern Germany. Alpine glaciers began to grow, destroying pastures and villages.

In addition to economic consequences, climate change has had dramatic social changes. Basically, they were also set by the economy, which changed with the Little Ice Age.

Social Shifts in Europe: A Change of Course.

The social dimensions of the climatic shift in the second half of the 16th century were diverse and many serious works have been devoted to their study. .

The changes that occurred required an explanation within the framework of understanding the world of that time. People still actively believed in the intervention of higher powers. As a result, they found the culprits - witches, presumably affecting the weather with witchcraft. The hunt for them began. Here is what B. Fagan writes : “In the small town of Wiesensteig in Germany, 63 women were put to death at the stake in 1563 during a heated debate about the intervention of God in the weather (note: the burning occurred before the first harsh winter - S.P.). Witch hunts broke out periodically after the 1560s. Between 1580 and 1620 in the Bern region alone, more than 1,000 people were burned for witchcraft. Witch accusations in France and England peaked in the difficult years of 1587 and 1588. Almost invariably, the psychosis of the executions coincided with the most difficult years of the Little Ice Age, when people demanded the destruction of witches, considering them to be the culprits of misfortunes. We add that the burning of a witch was usually accompanied by the sale of her property and a feast for the proceeds, as they would now say, a banquet. Therefore, often rich bourgeois women became the object of persecution.

Discussions about the nature of weather variations, even such, meant the emergence of meteorology . Even then, weather observations and temperature measurements began. At that time, many other sciences arose - and also in forms unusual for our eyes. For example, alchemy has become active - and has achieved huge support the mighty of the world Togo! European rulers and other influential people, who became less well-off as a result of a decrease in their usual incomes, were also looking for such ways to fill the treasury. Astrology also became active - in unstable times, everyone wanted to know their future. Even Tycho Brahe and Kepler made horoscopes.

At the same time, fantasies about robotics arose - the first robot was the mythical Golem of the Prague Rabbi Lev. He made it out of clay and put a piece of paper with a task in his ear - why not a program! The clay man was able to work for the master, replacing a living servant and saving wages.

Fig. 3 Drawings of the classic of mannerism Giovanni Bratselli - people-rings, people-rhombuses, robots, skeleton alchemists.

The same kind of mannerism - a strange but characteristic phenomenon that arose at that time in painting - known, in particular, for constructing a person from parts - geometric shapes, bird cages, homogeneous details. This is a completely unexpected phenomenon like cubism - but more than 300 years before it. Mannerism is not only a phenomenon of art. A man-bell, a man-winestone, a man-chest of drawers is the idea of ​​a mechanical doll with a given function, the same robot as the Golem, but concretized, ready to move into the sphere of design. The first technical revolution was not far away, and, as we can see, its technical design appeared ahead of schedule.

However, robots and machines are still far away, and money is needed today, it would be necessary to save on payments now. And in Europe, almost freed from serfdom during the rise of agriculture, a period of "second edition" of serfdom begins. A good confirmation of the observation that economic excesses give freedom - and vice versa. The introduction of serfdom was a clear step backwards, a typical regression, meaning a return to cashless payment for the services of the nobles.

Moreover, it should be noted that they tried to carry out the enslavement of the peasants where there was no serfdom before - for example, in Sweden, which needed a regular army. They accurately calculated how many peasants can support one soldier, how many - an officer, and assigned the maintenance of the army to the peasants. But in Sweden, serfdom still did not acquire strong features: Swedish harvests were too low, the people were unaccustomed to the yoke, but they were accustomed to weapons.

Therefore, perhaps Sweden has become an outstanding example of the revival of a method that also helped to make money in the past - piracy, mainly in the Baltic. And her neighbor Norway sent pirates into the North Sea to rob English merchants sailing to Russia and back. English corsairs at the same time robbed Spanish ships.

Sweden also remembered and multiplied the successes of the Vikings on land, becoming one of the main winners of the Thirty Years' War and snatching off huge chunks of the Baltic Sea coast.

At the same time, monarchical power began to grow stronger; its attack on the rights of cities began. Absolutism is a new form of economic and social organization.

The pressures of climate change and its economic impacts are clearly responsible for a range of bloody events the beginning of the Little Ice Age - for example, for the civil wars in France of 1562-1594, the most acute period of which was started by the famous Bartholomew's Night (August 24, 1572). The rise in prices started there from the beginning XV century, but the main events of multilateral social conflict occurred during a period of particularly marked decline in agricultural production.

And in Spain of that time, there is a decline in agriculture and an amazing way to replenish the treasury - a 10% tax on each sale (with 4 resales, it was more than 40% of the original price). Spain tried to introduce the same tax in the Netherlands (in addition to fighting heretic Protestants) - there came a long period of uprisings and wars (1567-1609).

But England began to develop a really new approach: intensive agriculture, the capitalist mode of production in the countryside. IN XVI century in England, 46 essays on agronomic topics were published. In the first half XVI century, English “sheep ate people” (Thomas More), that is, large wool producers fenced their plots and drove out small tenants, in the second large farms began to grow in other industries. Agricultural technology grew rapidly. But even here there were political events that can be associated with a cold snap - England took possession of Ireland, weakened by crop failures, and almost subjugated Scotland, where famine also raged.

What did we find in the history of that time? If, in response to climatic complications, some countries returned to the past - serfdom, piracy, mysticism, then in other countries capitalism won - in XVI - XVII centuries, and England, and the Netherlands, and France, with varying levels of complications, moved to the development of manufactories, the active development of trade. The climate shock has dramatically accelerated this transition. But then the uneven development of Europe gave rise to the largest conflict, comparable to world wars XX century - the Thirty Years' War, where the trace of the climate shift had a "generalizing character" and those better adapted to it defeated the losers.

Note that acute economic conflicts XVI century gave rise to a number of terrible historical figures like Henry VIII (1500-1547), who executed about 72 thousand people in England, Marie de Medici (1519-1589), who provoked a bloody war in France, Philip II (1556-1598), who contributed to the decline of Spain and many years bloody war in the Netherlands. But the rulers who contributed to progress were not distinguished by good characters - remember Elizabeth I Tudor, who did a lot for the development of English capitalism and colonialism, however, a merciless lady, William of Orange, who fiercely fought for leadership in the Dutch revolution, French Henry IV , who ended the war in France and contributed to its bourgeois turn, later killed by enemies. And as for the figures who are strange or simply crazy - there were more of those on the thrones than ever before. Of particular note is Emperor Rudolf II (1552-1612), collector and philanthropist, admirer of alchemy and magic, who loved everything unusual.
For graphics were used Pfister, C. Brázdil, R. Glaser, R. Climatic Variability in Sixteenth-Century Europe and Its Social Dimension. Dordrecht-Boston-London: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1999.

Behringer W. Climatic Change and Witch-Hunting: The Impact of the Little Ice Age on Mentalities IN: Climatic Variability in Sixteenth-Century Europe and Its Social DimensionSpecial Issue of Climate Change, Vol. 43, no. 1 September 1999

The real famine began in Russia in 1601. Peasant farms were in a state of complete desolation: crop failure put millions of Russian people on the brink of survival. Someone who was younger and stronger migrated in search of a better life to the south and east. It was at this time that the growth of the number of Cossacks on the borders of the Russian state continued. But most families survived somehow in their villages. Many couldn't resist. According to modern data, Russia lost at least half a million people in that terrible famine year.

The famine of 1601 was one of the links in the chain of terrible and not very consequences of the Little Ice Age. As you know, this is the name of the period of large-scale and very strong cooling during the XIV-XIX centuries. At this time, the climate of Europe changed for the worse, colder, which could not but affect agriculture, the state of communications and, in general, the social life of European states. Russia was no exception in the list of European countries affected by global cooling.

Researchers now agree that main reason The onset of the Little Ice Age in Europe was the slowdown of the Gulf Stream, which occurred around 1300. After that, the climate in Western Europe began to seriously change for the worse. At first, it became seriously cold even in summer, a large amount of precipitation began to fall, which led to the death of crops in 1312-1315. Constant rains and cold weather have caused serious damage to European agriculture, especially in the northern regions of Western Europe. If before even in Northern Germany and Scotland there were vineyards, then after the cold years, viticulture in these regions ceased. After the cold snap of those years, viticulture forever remained the prerogative of the inhabitants of only Southern Europe - Italy, Spain, Portugal, France, Greece. Snow fell in Italy, which used to be an extremely rare occurrence, for which the Italian peasants, accustomed to the heat, were not ready.

The cold snap led to famine in Western Europe, which, in turn, caused a series of peasant uprisings against the feudal lords. The economic situation in European countries was rapidly deteriorating, which led to a number of negative consequences. Thus, the advance of glaciers in Greenland led to the virtual disappearance of cattle breeding and agriculture on the island. The once prosperous Norwegian colony began to empty rapidly, which was facilitated not only by the crisis of Greenlandic agriculture, but also by the difficulty of communication with the mainland. In 1378, the Greenlandic bishopric in Gardar was abolished, and by the 16th century, European settlements in Greenland finally ceased to exist. Travelers who arrived on the island in the 18th century found only Eskimos here.

The onset of the Little Ice Age affected Russia somewhat later than European countries. The most difficult for the Russian land turned out to be the 16th century. The cold snap hit Russian agriculture no less than European, which led to a general deterioration in the quality of life of the population. If earlier European travelers wrote about the relative prosperity of the Russian peasants, then due to a cold snap, the situation began to change. Within one century alone, grain prices in Russia have risen eightfold. Crop failure and rising food prices led to a protracted economic crisis, which, under the conditions of that time, was inevitably followed by a demographic decline. In other words, many villages simply died of hunger. Sources testify to the mass mortality of people in the 1540s - 1560s. In search of a better life, people poured from the starving and cold regions of Central Russia to the south and southeast. The most serious blow was dealt to the economy and demography of the northwestern regions of Russia. Here the cold snap manifested itself most clearly and created the most serious obstacles for agriculture. In the period between 1500-1550. the population of the northwestern Russian lands decreased by about 15%. The situation in Veliky Novgorod deteriorated greatly, then in the Moscow lands. Population decline reached catastrophic proportions in the northwest and in the center of the Russian state.

Simultaneously with the demographic decline in the north and in the center of Russia, there was a general increase in the number of Cossacks. It is the XVI - XVII centuries. became a period of maximum growth in the number of Cossacks - not only on the Don, but also on the Volga and Yaik. Many inhabitants of the central Russian lands fled to the Cossack lands and joined the Cossacks. After all, the climate in the southern regions was still more favorable, and the very way of life of the Cossacks provided more opportunities for food. In the Commonwealth, which also experienced the impact of the Little Ice Age, similar processes began. Many residents of the more northern regions of the Commonwealth, primarily the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, hurried to move south, to the Zaporozhye lands, replenishing the ranks of the Zaporozhye Cossacks.

In parallel, crime increased in the vast expanses of the Muscovite kingdom and in the Wild Steppe. Fleeing from hunger and cold to the south, many inhabitants of the Russian lands, for lack of other means of obtaining a livelihood, became robbers. The incredible increase in the number of robbers during this period was reported by many European and Eastern travelers.

At the same time, during this period, the number of Slavic slaves in the slave markets of the Crimean Khanate also increased, reaching its historical maximum. This was due to two reasons. Firstly, the Crimean khans immediately took advantage of the depopulation of many villages in Central Russia and began to intensively raid, taking Russian peasants into the crowd, and secondly, many peasants who tried to move south themselves fell into the hands of slave traders along the way. The same can be said about people from the Commonwealth. By the way, in the slave markets of Crimea, people from the Polish-Lithuanian lands were valued higher than the former subjects of the Moscow Tsar - because of the obstinate temper of the latter.
In 1571, the troops of the Crimean Khan Devlet Giray laid siege to Moscow. The campaign was undertaken by the Crimean Khan with a very specific task - to rob the Russian capital and capture as much as possible more people for subsequent sale into slavery in the slave markets of the Crimea. On June 3, Crimean troops reached the outskirts of Moscow and ravaged the settlements and villages, and then set them on fire. Instead of fighting the Crimean horde, the Zemstvo army began a disorderly retreat, and the voivode commanding them, Prince Belsky, died. A terrible fire began, which destroyed the entire wooden Moscow in three hours. Nevertheless, the khan did not go to the siege of the Kremlin and retired from the capital towards the steppe, taking with him up to 150 thousand prisoners - men, women, children.

The famine and the Crimean campaigns were only part of the terrible misfortunes that hit Rus' after the cold snap. After the year 1570 turned out to be a poor harvest and led to the fact that people were ready to kill each other for food, an epidemic of plague began in 1571. In Europe, the worst plague epidemic, nicknamed the "Black Death", took place two centuries earlier - just when Europe was faced with a large-scale cooling. In 1346, the plague was brought from Central Asia to the Crimea, and then penetrated into Europe. Already in 1348, 15 million people became victims of the plague, which was at least a quarter of the then population of Europe. By 1352, in Europe, the number of victims of the plague had reached 25 million people, which at that time was one third of the population.

The plague epidemic in the Moscow kingdom in 1571, of course, was not as large-scale as the Black Death that swept Europe in the 14th century. However, many people still died from the disease. The corpses were buried even without coffins, in mass graves, the number of those who died from this terrible disease was so great. It was hunger and plague, and by no means the “atrocities of the guardsmen,” that caused the devastation of Russian lands in the 1570s.

An even more terrible famine awaited Rus' three decades later. On February 19, 1600, in distant Peru, the existence of which the overwhelming majority of the inhabitants of Rus' did not even suspect at that time, the Huaynaputina volcano erupted. As a result of the eruption, which became the largest event of its kind in South America about 1,500 people died. But in addition to human casualties among the Peruvian Indians, the volcanic eruption also led to a large-scale climate change towards further cooling. Europe, and then Russia, were swept by heavy rains that lasted ten weeks. In fact, the Russian lands were left without a crop, which caused starvation among the population.

The famine quickly assumed the features of a national catastrophe. In Moscow itself, at least 127,000 people died of starvation within two years. The landowners quickly came up with effective method fighting hunger in their possessions - they simply gave freedom to their serfs or simply drove them out "to free bread" so as not to feed them. In turn, starving peasant families died out en masse. Young and strong men were looking for another way to soak - they strayed into bands of robbers, robbing on the highways. Gangs could include dozens and even hundreds of robbers, which made the fight against them a big problem for the Moscow authorities. Some travelers reported cases of cannibalism in the villages, where people literally went crazy with hunger.

On the other hand, the clergy and landlords, who owned huge stocks of grain, significantly increased their fortunes by engaging in speculative grain trading. Tsar Boris Godunov was unable to control the situation and, at least, to achieve the sale of bread not at speculative prices. All this together led to a sharp surge of popular discontent, numerous uprisings, the largest of which was the uprising of Cotton. Then an impressive army, assembled by False Dmitry I, moved to Moscow. The political situation in the country rapidly destabilized. On April 13 (23), 1605, at the most inopportune moment, Tsar Boris Godunov died. One of the most tragic pages in Russian history began - Time of Troubles.

The Great Famine of 1601-1603 led to serious consequences for the political and social development Russian state. If politically the famine was followed by the Time of Troubles, the Polish invasion, the Russian-Swedish war, numerous peasant uprisings and the establishment of the Romanov dynasty, socially the Great Famine contributed to the settlement of the previously sparsely populated outskirts of the country - lands on the Don, Volga and Yaik. The number of Cossacks during this period increased even more.

The Little Ice Age significantly changed the climatic conditions in the Russian state. Winters became longer, summers shorter, crop yields decreased, which could not but affect the general living conditions of the population. Half a century after the Great Famine of 1601-1603, during the next Russian-Polish war, the Polish troops could hardly endure the harsh months of the winter of 1656. During the campaign, frost alone killed up to 2,000 Polish soldiers and about a thousand horses. At the same time, the Polish troops suffered such losses only in the southern regions of the Russian state. So the cold became one of the main "allies" of Russia, to whose help the country then resorted more than once.

Russia experienced a new wave of cooling in the middle - second half of the 18th century. The consequences this time were less devastating than in the 16th-17th centuries. However, the next phase of the Little Ice Age contributed to further cooling. Travelers who were in Siberia at that time noted very severe frosts, a long winter. So, Johann Falk, a Swedish traveler who visited the Siberian lands in 1771, noted snow blizzards in May and September. By this time, Russia had long had the image of a very cold country, although before the onset of the Little Ice Age, travelers did not particularly focus on the peculiarities of Russian climatic conditions. The well-known "wintering" of the French troops of Napoleon in Russia also became a real test for European soldiers precisely because of the deterioration of the climate after the onset of the Little Ice Age.

Many researchers note, however, the presence of positive consequences of the Little Ice Age. For example, Margaret Anderson associated them with the large-scale settlement of the New World. People traveled to South and North America in search of a better life as life in Europe became more and more difficult. Thanks to the cooling, there was a much greater need for heat sources, which led to the development of coal mining in European countries. For coal mining, industrial enterprises were created, a class of professional workers was formed - coal miners. That is, the cold snap contributed to the scientific, technological and economic revolution in Europe at the junction late medieval and New Age.

According to the characteristics of the climate, the past millennium is usually divided into three epochs. The first of them, characterized by noticeable warming, is called the climatic optimum (this is the 8th-12th centuries). The second was called the Little Ice Age, which ended in the middle of the 19th century, when the era of a new warming began in the northern hemisphere. For a long time, the 15th century was considered the beginning of the Little Ice Age. However, in recent years, based on data on the advance of glaciers, dendrological, radiocarbon studies, as well as on the basis of the analysis of historical documents, an increasing number of scientists have come to the conclusion that the gradual cooling in Europe began much earlier.

One of the reports, prepared back in 1981, was called "Code of Extreme Natural Phenomena in Russian Chronicles of the 11th-17th Centuries." Such a code was compiled by V. M. Pasetsky, Doctor of Historical Sciences, and E. P. Borisenkov, Doctor of Physical and Mathematical Sciences, director of the Main Geophysical Observatory. A. I. Voeikova (GGO). They did a great job - they studied page by page the published annals, annals, chronicles, chronographs, which were included both in the 35-volume Complete Collection of Russian Chronicles, and in other editions of the 19th-20th centuries.

Russian chronicles are not only the history of the country, not only its great cultural and scientific heritage, but also the history of our nature. The annals contain more than a thousand records of extraordinary natural phenomena. Here are references to cruel winters and hopeless summer rains that rotted both hay and bread, descriptions of earthquakes, hurricanes, unprecedented floods, stories about the return of cold weather that destroyed gardens and fields. Sheets of yellowed parchment, as it were, convey to our days the rumble of forgotten storms and the smell of smoke that enveloped the Russian Plain in the years when there were "heats of the great" and not only forests, but also swamps burned.

More than 16 thousand drawings (XII-XVI centuries) are included in the Radziwill Chronicle and the Facial Code, many of which are also dedicated to various extraordinary natural phenomena.

In Russian chronicles, the first information about weather conditions dates back to 860. During the siege of Tsargrad, Askold's ships were caught in a fierce storm, and "Great waves swept away the ships of the pagan Russians and nailed them to the shore and broke them." Then for a whole century there were almost no records of natural phenomena. Their systematic registration began in the last quarter of the tenth century. The unique records of the first vaults brought to our days information about strong winds, hurricanes and thunderstorms that caused "a lot of dirty tricks to people, cattle, animals" (979), about a strong earthquake in Byzantium (989), about a flood that did a lot of evil (991), about the great "dry" and "good heat" that destroyed the crops of bread (994), and, finally, about the great flood in the last year of the first millennium of our era.

Such regular registration of extreme natural phenomena is the result of the fact that it was at this time that the compilation of annals began - records of the most important events in the life of Rus'. Approximately at the same time - at the turn of two millennia - steps were taken to study not only Russian nature. Travelers under the guise of merchants ("guests") went to Rome, Jerusalem, Babylon, Egypt to describe the lands, cities, customs and customs there.

Interestingly, the first Russian chroniclers considered nature as a character in history, which is very active, and sometimes menacingly intrudes into the life of Rus', bringing its inhabitants both joys and misfortunes, an abundance of "all sorts of fruits" and severe crop shortages. Such an attitude to nature, which began in the 10th century, has passed through many centuries.

Most of the natural history information in the annals was entered by eyewitnesses of these events and phenomena, which gives the records a special value and reliability.

Based on the records of Nikon, Nestor, Sylvester and many other chroniclers who remained unknown, we can say that in the 11th century, warm and often dry weather prevailed on the territory of Rus' from Novgorod and Suzdal to Kiev and Chernigov.

According to the news of the Nikonovsky Svod, in 1008, Rus' experienced a terrible drought and was invaded by pests. This summer, a lot of "pruzi", as the ancient chroniclers call the locust, came to the Russian land. Later chroniclers will describe in more detail such a natural disaster, when pests ate not only crops, but even grass. A great heat hit the southern Russian lands in 1017. On one of these hot days, Kyiv flared up like a candle. In the fire, "many mansions and about 700 churches" perished. Seven years later (1024) the drought recurred. Then for more than three decades, judging by the chronicles, there were no natural disasters on our lands.

In the third quarter of the 11th century (1067), an unusually severe snowy winter was noted for the first time. In the last quarter of the 11th century, the first note about the epidemic: "pestilence on people throughout the Russian land"(1083)— and then there is the mention of the earthquake (1091). In 1070, a famine caused by a drought. And then for two decades, no rare phenomena were noted in the Russian chronicles. The countries of Western Europe also did not experience particularly large natural shocks in these two decades.

The next drought hit Rus' in 1092. The summer was cloudless. From "rainlessness" and heat, forests and swamps (peat bogs) caught fire by themselves. This disaster engulfed Kyiv and other western lands. A severe famine struck Rus', an epidemic began. Only in Kyiv, where about 50 thousand inhabitants then lived, from mid-November 1092 to February 1093, 7 thousand coffins were sold. In other words, 14 percent of the city's population died from hunger and "various ailments" in four months. In neighboring lands - in Polotsk, in Drutsk - hunger and an epidemic also claimed many lives.

Two years later, the drought recurred. This misfortune was aggravated by the invasion of locusts, which ate "every herb and much bread." According to the chronicler, this "was not heard from the first days in the Russian land." The following year, “locusts came again ... and covered the earth and it was scary to watch, they went to the northern countries, devouring grass and millet.”

Perhaps this is the only period in the 11th century when years with especially dangerous meteorological phenomena that caused a severe, protracted famine were so closely grouped. In total, in the 11th century, Russian chronicles recorded eight droughts, one rainy summer, one hurricane storm, four severe winters, one high flood, one earthquake.

* * *

In the XII century, warm and dry weather still prevails.

In 1103, locust hordes reappear. Two years later, "bezdozhiya" was repeated. Kyiv, Novgorod, Chernigov, Smolensk burned down almost to the ground. One by one happened two earthquakes (1107 and 1109), information about which is contained in the Lavrentiev, and the First Novgorod, and Nikon chronicles.

In all these codes, it is noted that in 1124 "all summer long be without a dog." During this drought, crops were damaged and Kyiv was again almost completely burned down. Died in a fire "without the number of people and any living creatures." Next year "great storm" swept over Novgorod land, "drowning herds of cattle in Volkhov" and causing severe hunger.

All these events became a harbinger of qualitatively new extreme climatic phenomena, which were first noted in 1127 by the chroniclers of Veliky Novgorod. For the first time in many decades, a very cold long spring has stood out. Snow lay "until Jacob's Day" (May 13, New Style). They sowed late, the summer, apparently, was very dry: an invasion of the "broom" was noted, which ate all the crops in the fields and the fruits in the gardens. In the autumn, when the harvest had not yet been completed, “mraz killed” all spring and winter grains. Hunger has begun. The inhabitants of the Novgorod land ate birch bark, linden and maple leaves, moss, horse meat, and mixed straw into flour. And in the next year, 1128, according to the chronicle, "Be the water great, drown the people and the life and mansion demolished." In the summer, when spring crops were in bloom and winter crops were in full bloom, frost hit. All the bread is gone. It was a rough time. Bread has risen in price. In villages and cities, the dead of hunger lay right on the streets. Everyone who could only dispersed to foreign lands. Such phenomena have not been recorded in the annals until that time. Perhaps it was then that the gradual cooling of the climate began; the period of climatic optimum, which lasted from the 8th to the 12th century and was generally distinguished by favorable climatic conditions, was ending.

In 1134, a “great storm” came to the southern Russian lands, which had never happened before. According to the Ipatiev Chronicle, the storm carried the mansions, goods, crates and livestock from the Humen. The hurricane was breaking "Just groves, as if the army took."

In mid-August 1143, heavy rains began, which continued until mid-December and caused unprecedented floods in the Novgorod land, as a result of which the stocks of hay and firewood on the stubble were carried away by water. The weather of 1145 is described in detail in the annals: at first it was a hot, warm summer, and before the harvest it rained continuously, and people “did not see clear days” until winter itself. The flood was worse than in 1143. In all of Rus', they could neither harvest nor harvest hay. Winter has come snowless and wet. The following year, bread was not harvested in the southern Russian lands. Those years were also hungry in Germany and Austria.

It turns out that in the mid-forties, another grouping of years saturated with especially dangerous meteorological phenomena looms. And until the end of the century, such situations were repeated twice more.

At first it was in 1161-1168, when the instability of the weather led to dire consequences. In 1161 there were observed "a bucket and great heat and dryness through the whole summer." According to the chronicle, "burned every living thing and every abundance, and the lakes and rivers dried up, the swamps burned out, the forests and the earth burned." And then frost "kill all the yar." In autumn, severe frosts set in. In winter, thaws began with heavy rains. According to the Novgorod chronicle, hunger seized all of Rus', "Great was the affliction...and the need was for people." In 1163, severe frosts hit again in autumn, and in winter, on the contrary, it rained with thunderstorms. Ice on the rivers during these years often appeared only in February. Mild winters alternated with extremely cold ones. Such were the winters of 1165 and 1168.

At the end of the 80s and the first half of the 90s, there was the last, fourth in a row, grouping of extreme meteorological phenomena in the 12th century. In Russian chronicles, about 120 of them are noted. Including 12 droughts, 5 unusual snowfalls, 7 hurricane storms, 7 damp and 6 severe winters. And several high floods and floods, observed not only in spring, but also in summer. The winter in 1187 was especially bad. There had never been such frosts as there were then in Rus'. At this time, an epidemic broke out. There were sick people in every house. Often there was no one to give water to.

The 12th century for the regions of Kyiv and Novgorod was a time of unprecedented seismicity. 10 earthquakes are recorded in chronicles during this century. A significant increase in the number of extraordinary natural phenomena indicates that there has been a deterioration in meteorological conditions in Rus' and that tendencies of a gradual cooling of the climate have already appeared, which became especially noticeable in the first third of the 13th century.

* * *

The thirteenth century began with rains, and they rained continuously throughout the summer of 1201. In 1203 severe frosts came. Eight years later, the drought swept Livonia and North-Eastern Rus'. Crops died. Fires raged. Only in Novgorod burned down 4300 yards. Rostov the Great suffered even worse. Almost no choir or churches survived in it. And as a result, “the gladness was great” not only in Rus', but throughout the Baltics. Bread has skyrocketed in price. People ate dogs and cats. The years 1214 and 1241 were dry and hungry. And in 1224, sultry windy weather was established in Rus'. Forests and peat bogs burned. The smoke was so strong that the people nearby could not distinguish each other. The mist "came to the ground." Birds could not soar, fell to the ground and died. “All sorts of animals” fled from forests and fields to cities and villages, “to go to a man”, they looked for salvation from people. According to the chronicle, "there was fear and horror on all." Crop failures hit all Russian lands. But the worst famine of the 13th century was yet to come. In 1230, from the Annunciation to Ilyin's day (that is, from the beginning of April to August, according to the new style), it rained day and night. The summer was very cold, and on September 14 the frost killed "abundance" throughout the Russian land, "except Kyiv." The Great Famine lasted for about four years. In Novgorod, more than 3,000 people died of starvation, and in Smolensk, 32,000 people were buried in mass graves. Thus, almost before the Tatar invasion, Rus' lost a significant part of its population from hunger and epidemics, many cities were depopulated.

Taken together, the facts about weather anomalies certainly show that in the first 30 years of the 13th century there was a gradual deterioration in climatic conditions. However, in nature, everything is not so straightforward and simple. After the catastrophic year 1230, for almost 20 years, Russian chroniclers note only solar and lunar eclipses, and there are no reports of any special meteorological phenomena. Very few of them were recorded during this period in Western European chronicles.

In the summer of 1251, endless rains came to the Novgorod land and, probably, other regions of Rus' and drowned all the bread and all the hay in the reapers. In autumn, "scum beat all the abundance." In the summer of 1259 frosts hit.

Then follows a respite. For more than ten years, chroniclers have not noted other extraordinary phenomena, except for eclipses of the Moon, the Sun, and polar lights.

In the early 70s, due to heavy rains, Rus', like the European continent, was gripped by famine. Four years in a row no bread was born.

In the last quarter of the 13th century, the number of dangerous meteorological phenomena still increased significantly. Storms raged, during which many people and livestock died. Hurricane gusts of wind lifted entire yards into the air and carried them far away "along with people and all life."

Winter colds were fierce, in spring and summer the rivers overflowed their banks. At the end of summer or at the beginning of autumn, frosts beat "all the abundance." In 1298, in Rus', forests and swamps, mosses and fields burned from a severe drought. A pestilence on cattle began, and then a "great need for the people."

In total, more than 120 extreme natural phenomena were noted in the 13th century, including 12 droughts, 21 rainy periods (summer, autumn), 15 unusually cold winters. One of the longest periods falls on this century, in which extraordinary natural phenomena are concentrated. These are the years 1211-1230, among which there were 14 famine years. The next three groups fall on the last third of the XIII century, which indicates a further deterioration of climatic conditions in Rus'.

* * *

The XIV century began with "very great" storms. Hurricane gusts of wind “tore dube”, brought down temples and residential buildings from the base. Crops and hayfields suffered from the great rains . In 1301–1302, “people didn’t get bread,” noted in the Novgorod, Pskov and other chronicles.

In 1306 there were "great" rains in Rus', and the next summer, as is known from the Russian Chronograph, there was a famine in the Czech Republic from the “great drought”. In the Trinity Chronicle of 1309, there is evidence that after six unusually rainy years, sultry weather set in and with it a drought. In addition, “another execution fell upon the people - a mouse came and ate rye and wheat, and oats, and all sorts of living things.” The prices for bread jumped sharply, and there was a "smoothness strong throughout the Russian land," which lasted for at least three years. Equally fatal consequences were caused by the return of cold weather in the summer of 1314, when the frost killed "the whole yar". Famine began in the Baltics as well. The summer of 1322 turned out to be very difficult for the Smolensk land, when it rained and the cold persisted. The harvest of vegetables and fruits perished. The winter that came after the bad weather turned out to be unusually severe, with severe frosts. According to Western European sources, not only the Baltic, but also the Adriatic Sea froze. The following winter, severe colds recurred. Natural disasters shook all of Europe almost continuously from 1310 to 1328.

At the very end of the first quarter of the 14th century, as in the previous three centuries, a drought began. In the annals, the “great suhmen” was noted in 1325. Forests and peatlands burned out. Crops and hay on stubble perished. Many water sources dried up.

Unusual heat stood in Rus' in 1364 and 1365. According to the Nikon Chronicle, “From the fall and the heat and the heat, the greats were blowing, the forests and swamps and the earth were burning, and the rivers had dried up, while other water places were dry to the end and beat great fear and horror on all people and great sorrow.”

Another great drought occurs in 1371. The earth was enveloped in the smoke of burning forests and conflagrations. People "for a single sazhen" did not see each other. Bears, wolves and foxes sought refuge in cities and villages.

“That same summer there was a sign in the sun, black places, like nails, and a great haze stood in a row for two months, and only a great haze was, as if two fathoms in front of me, I couldn’t see a man in the face, and I didn’t see a bird in the air fly, but fall from the air to the ground, and tacos walk along the ground. But then life is expensive, and low water among people, and the impoverishment of the brush, the cost is great. But then the summer is dry, the life has dried up, and the forest and the bog and the oak forests and swamps are burning, but in some places the earth is hotter.

Three years later, the drought recurred:“There hasn’t been a single drop of rain from above all summer.”

So, the middle of the XIV century is characterized by the predominance of dry, hot weather in summer, moderate and mild winters.

Severe frosts, cold autumns and late springs began in the last quarter of the 14th century. Particularly severe frosts were observed in 1391 and 1393, when many people and livestock died from severe frosts, and crops were damaged.

In total, more than 130 extreme natural phenomena were noted in the chronicles in the XIV century. 12 droughts were registered, of which 8 affected the whole of Rus'. During the heat and “no rain”, Moscow, Novgorod, Pskov, Yuryev (now Tartu), Vologda, Vitebsk, Toropets, Vladimir, Smolensk, Tver, Kashin, Suzdal, Torzhok, Nizhny Novgorod burned down. Three especially dangerous groups fall on the first third, and three others - on the 60s and 80s of the century. In the XIV century in Rus', there are 29 hungry years. Of these, four famines were not only all-Russian, but also all-European in nature.

* * *

During the 15th century, chroniclers noted more than 150 rare natural phenomena. However, most of them were local in nature. And great rains, and great drought, and great frosts, as a rule, fell either on Pskov, then on Novgorod, then on Moscow land. They caused more than 40 famine years, 15 of them were especially difficult. Most of the time it was raining. 21 times in a century they caused great damage to winter and spring crops. Often they were not given the opportunity to harvest bread and sow winter crops. In 13 cases, crops died due to the return of cold weather either at the beginning or at the end of summer.

In 1406 there was an unprecedented storm:“The same summer, along Petrovdnya in the Novgorod volost of Nizhny, there was a great storm, and at that hour a man went out into the field and everywhere on a horse harnessed with a chariot, and the wind was taken with a horse and with a chariot like a storm, like in a coward and in a whirlwind of fear, the donde was invisible, and the next day, having found his chariot on a tree, hanging on a high tree, and then on the friends of the country of the great river Volga; the horse, besides the chariot, is dead lying knowing; but a man without a trace: not ved, kamo sya deed.

In 1420, in mid-September, it snowed for three days. The frosts hit, and the great cold lasted for a long time, which was replaced by a thaw. “In the summer of 6928, the sea was strong in Kostroma and in Yaroslavl and in Galich, on Plyos ... and taco died out, as if it would live and reap no komo, and the snow fell on Nikitin for a day and went for three days and three nights, fall on 4 spans and then sit and then few people that hedgehog; and be smooth on the sea."

Groupings of extraordinary natural phenomena in this century are observed, one might say, in all decades.

* * *

The 16th century is very similar to the previous one in terms of climatic conditions. Chroniclers note 20 droughts, 23 rainy periods, 13 cases of return of cold weather in spring, summer and early autumn, 22 severe and 8 mild winters, 5 hailstorms, 6 high floods.

During the drought of 1508, 3,315 souls burned in Veliky Novgorod and "God knows how many drowned people", seeking salvation from the fire in Volkhov. Rains in the summer of 1516 and 1518 led to the death of crops of rye and rye. A particularly large crop loss is associated with heavy rains during the harvest in the summer of 1557. And the Trans-Volga region in the same year suffered greatly because "the scum broke all the bread." According to the chronicles, "a lot of people have died in all the cities." In Veliky Ustyug "they ate fir and grass and bitch." Five years later, in the Novgorod and Pskov lands, after a very snowy winter and a high-water spring, a cold rainy summer came with northern winds and frosts. Rye and spring crops could not be harvested; it was impossible to sow winter crops. Subsequently, in 1563, the summer storm was repeated. After the rains that interfered with the cleaning, snow fell in those times when "bread in the field is not reaped and not dressed up". Many chronicles note the famine in all Moscow cities and throughout the Russian land, the death of many people.

Natural disasters followed one after another. Rains gave way to droughts, and droughts to endless bad weather. By the end of the 60s of the 16th century, bread prices jumped 10 times. At the turn of the 60s and 70s, due to extremely unfavorable meteorological conditions, “great ruin” occurred in the Moscow state. National disasters were aggravated by the intensification of landlord exploitation, the increase in tax oppression, and especially the terror of the oprichnina. For example, the Tver, Pskov and Novgorod lands, which really suffered heavily from malnutrition, were unfairly suspected by Ivan the Terrible of deceit and treason and defeated by his guardsmen. During these years, hundreds of thousands of people died in Rus' from hunger, epidemics and rampant oprichnina, including 10 thousand in Novgorod and 12 thousand in Veliky Ustyug. There are 45 famine years in the 16th century.

* * *

The winter from 1600 to 1601 was mild, with winter crops under the snow in some areas. In the summer of 1601, it rained continuously for 12 weeks. Then "Early in the summer there were great frosts." So it is written in the Pskov chronicles. In other chronicles, the dates of summer frosts are given: July 28, August 15 and 29. On September 1 (everywhere old style) it snowed. Winter and spring grains and "all vegetables" perished. In the first half of 1602, rye prices jumped 6 times. In the summer of 1602 frost struck again and destroyed the crops. In 1603, compared with 1601, the price of bread jumped 18 times already. According to contemporaries, in Moscow alone in 1601-1603, 120 thousand people died of starvation. Eyewitnesses of the great famine claim that it died out "a third of the kingdom of Moscow." Certain regions of Russia also suffered from famine in 1604-1608, when both the return of cold weather and prolonged rains were observed in the summer. The following decades were also difficult for farming. In 1619 and 1623, the disaster seized all of Europe and Rus' from Normandy to the Volga region.

Extreme natural phenomena became especially frequent in the 50s and 60s of the 17th century, which accounted for 10 famine years. In 1669 it was so cool in Astrakhan that until the end of June people “We didn’t go without warm clothes.” In the 80s, 3 invasions of locusts on the southern Russian lands were noted. Droughts continued into the 1990s, and then there were several such rainy years that in Finland, for example, about a third of the population died of starvation.

In the 17th century, there are 25 droughts, 12 rainy summer periods, 12 returns of cold weather in summer and early autumn, 17 cold winters. All this led to the fact that 32 years were very hungry. This also includes the great famine under Boris Godunov.

* * *

So, we have traced the testimonies of chroniclers about extreme natural phenomena for more than seven centuries. Collected in a single set, these evidences make it possible to determine the main trends in climate fluctuations.

First of all, you pay attention to the fact that the number of rare meteorological phenomena grew and reached its apogee in the XV-XVII centuries. These are droughts, and especially abundant summer rains, and returns of cold weather in summer or early autumn, and unprecedentedly severe winters.

The approach of the so-called Little Ice Age, judging by the Russian chronicles, begins to be felt quite clearly from the 12th century and is quite clearly manifested in the first third of the 13th century.

Both in the first climatic epoch (the period of the small European climatic optimum) and in the second, there were periods of relative stabilization of atmospheric processes, when sometimes ten or even twenty years, according to their climatic data, turned out to be close to normal. Extraordinary natural phenomena in the 11th-17th centuries sometimes had a local, sometimes all-Russian, and often all-European character. For seven centuries, Rus' as a whole or its individual lands survived more than 200 famine years.

Conclusions about how the climate has changed, obtained from historical sources, are largely confirmed by studies that are based on the use of various types of natural historical information. And we can say with confidence that the cornerstone has been laid for creating the climate history of the last millennium. The ultimate goal of this search, which involves representatives various areas Sciences, - accurate prediction of climate change in the future.

Surprisingly, the topic of a sharp cooling of the period of the 16-17th century is silent in our historiography. She is almost completely absorbed in the themes of the reigns of Grozny and Boris Godunov, the oprichnina and the Time of Troubles. The history of natural disasters can shed light not only on the events of Russian history in the 16th and 17th centuries, but even on our time. There is no doubt that the current warming of the climate is a natural way out of the Little Ice Age.

The LITTLE ICE AGE is a period of global cooling that took place on Earth during the 14th-19th centuries. The coldest time is attributed to the middle of the 16th century (in Western Europe - a very severe winter of 1564-1565). When examining the thickness of tree rings from 14 places in the Northern Hemisphere, it is clearly seen that from the beginning of the 16th century to its end, the thickness of tree rings decreased by a whole third!
The main reason for the cold is
1. deceleration of the Gulf Stream, which is the main "supplier" of heat to Europe 2. reduced solar activity. 3. increased activity of volcanoes. Mass eruptions into the atmosphere of ash, this can lead to global dimming and cooling. 4. cessation of mass burning of forests by the aboriginal population of America. Burning of forests was the main form of economy in pre-Columbian America. The extinction of the Indians as a result of infections introduced by Europeans led to an end to the massive annual fires in the Western Hemisphere and a reduction in CO2 emissions into the atmosphere. At the same time, the growth of American forests has led to a sharp increase in photosynthesis and, consequently, a decrease in the CO2 content in the Earth's atmosphere. In very simple terms, the more forest, the colder.
Climate change has affected a sharp decline in yields. From the 1560s to the end of the century, wheat prices in Europe rose 3-4 times everywhere. Western Europe suffered a series of mass hunger strikes. The northern countries suffered more - the Danish settlements in Greenland died out, the population of Iceland decreased by half, in Scandinavia, where there were also crop failures and famine, the population found salvation in the sea industry. Therefore, Sweden has become an outstanding example of the resurgence of piracy, mainly in the Baltic. Norway sent pirates into the North Sea to rob English merchants sailing to Russia and back. English corsairs at the same time robbed Spanish ships.
Sweden remembered and increased the successes of the Vikings on land, becoming one of the main victors of the Thirty Years' War and snatching off huge pieces of the Baltic Sea coast. Frosts destroyed vineyards in England, Poland, and northern Germany. Alpine glaciers began to grow, destroying pastures and villages. Frosts even affected northern Italy, as both Dante and Petrarch wrote about. According to archaeologists, the average height of a mature man in Northern Europe from the 15th-16th centuries to the 17th-18th centuries decreased by almost 4 cm - from 171.4 cm to 167.5 cm. And again began to recover only in the 19th century. explanations within the framework of understanding the world of that time. As a result, the culprits were found - witches, presumably affecting the weather with witchcraft. The hunt for them began. Almost invariably, the psychosis of the executions coincided with the most difficult years of the Little Ice Age, when people demanded the destruction of witches, considering them to be the culprits of misfortunes. We add that the burning of a witch was usually accompanied by the sale of her property and a feast for the proceeds, as they would now say, a banquet. Therefore, often rich bourgeois women became the object of persecution.
What did we find in the history of that time? If, in response to climatic complications, some countries returned to the past - serfdom, piracy, mysticism, then in other countries capitalism won. Acute economic conflicts of the 16th century gave rise to a number of terrible historical figures like Henry VIII (1500-1547), people in England, Marie de Medici (1519-1589), Philip II (1556-1598), Elizabeth I Tudor, William of Orange, Henry IV of France. And as for the figures who are strange or simply crazy - there were more of those on the thrones than ever before. Of particular note is Emperor Rudolf II (1552-1612), a collector and philanthropist, an admirer of alchemy and magic, who loved everything unusual.
Throughout the Little Ice Age, peasant uprisings and riots broke out, the nature of wars changed, they became more cruel. Some researchers (Margaret Anderson) also associate the settlement of America with the consequences of the Little Ice Age - people went for a better life from "God forsaken" Europe. RUSSIA Rus' - Russia was seriously affected by abrupt climate change, although the Little Ice Age affected our territory somewhat later Europe. The most difficult time was the 16th century. In one century, grain prices in Russia have increased by about eight times. Historians have noted that unfavorable changes began to come from the North. In the years 1500-1550, the population in the North-West decreases by 12-17%; central and eastern regions
The years 1548–1550, 1555–1556, 1558, 1560–1561 were difficult for Russia, and 1570–71 were catastrophic. The long period of 1587-1591 was difficult. Tellingly, these same years are marked as stages of the economic crisis. Russia XVI century, which caused the greatest demographic losses. The consequences of the Little Ice Age are reflected in the annals. 1549 - "bread was expensive on the Dvina ... and many people died of hunger, 200 and 300 people were put in one pit." The decline in population according to payment records in the 1570-80s was 76.7% around Novgorod, and 57.4% around Moscow. The figures of desolation in only two years of catastrophic years reached 96% in Kolomna, 83% in Murom, in many places up to 80% of the land was abandoned. for a piece of bread, a man killed a man." Following a crop failure, in 1571 an epidemic of plague followed. The same Staden wrote: “In addition, the almighty God sent another great pestilence ... The plague intensified, and therefore large pits were dug in the field around Moscow, and the corpses were dumped there without coffins, 200, 300, 400, 500 pieces in one bunch. In the Muscovite state, special churches were built along the main roads; they daily prayed that the Lord would have mercy and avert the plague from them.
The raid of the Crimeans on Moscow in 1571 was also provoked by the colossal losses of the population from famine and plague. The Tatars took advantage of this moment, they did it, as a review of their largest raids shows, often. The troops of Devlet Gerey besieged Moscow several times, in 1571 they started a severe fire in the city, which practically destroyed the city. Only the victory in 1572 in the Battle of Molodi saved Russia from enslavement.
Staden, presenting to Rudolf II a plan for the conquest of Russia, described in it the state Russian cities, prisons and churches after the famine - "... up the Volga lies another large settlement called Kholopy, where there was usually bargaining all year round; Turks, Persians, Armenians, Bukharans, Shemakhans, Kisilbashi, Siberians, Nagai, Cherkasy, German and Polish merchants. Out of 70 cities, Russian merchants were assigned to this fair and had to come to it every year. Here the Grand Duke collected large customs revenues from year to year; now this settlement is completely deserted. Further, you can reach the city of Uglich by water ; the city is completely empty. Next lies the city of Dmitrov; and this city is also empty ... Volok Lamsky is an unprotected city, deserted ... In the center of the state, all of them [forts] have fallen and become deserted ... According to my calculation, about 10,000 churches in Russian Land are empty, maybe , even more, but [in any case] no less: Russian worship is not performed in them. Several thousand churches [already] rotted ... ".
Note that these prosperous cities never regained their significance, and Kholopy Posad simply ceased to exist. If we take Staden's words as a plausible estimate, and assume that the arrival of one church was 100-200 people, the desolation of 10 thousand churches would mean the disappearance of 1-2 million parishioners, and even more with children. People captured by the famine of 1570 , mostly fled to the south, to the border of the Wild Field, although it was dangerous because of the Crimeans. Similar processes took place in the Commonwealth - and there was an outflow of the population to the south and the growth of Cossack communities.
The regions where the starving fled were also Zavolzhye, Lower Volga, and also. the Yaik and Don rivers - there the Cossack population began to grow rapidly after 1570. In fact, many of the actions of Ivan the Terrible were largely motivated by the super-difficult climatic and military situation in which Russia was located. Oprichnina, introduced by Grozny in the winter of 1564-1565, was not only political an act, but also an economic invention - more valuable lands were taken into the oprichnina, they were transferred to loyal people. The fight against the boyars (including the seizure of their wealth, deprivation of their power) was very similar to what happened in Europe. Campaign he gave huge booty to Livonia - the Englishman Horsey described it as follows: “The wealth taken by money, goods and other treasures and taken out of this country, its cities, as well as from 600 robbed churches, cannot be listed.” Gradual movement to the warm south (Kazan and Astrakhan), the increasing restriction of the Crimean Khanate. Spontaneous Cossack colonization was already moving in this direction.
Unusual cold became one of the prerequisites for the beginning of the Time of Troubles. The catastrophe of 1570 was surpassed in 1601-1603. It was the coldest period in 600 recent years. He, by the way, was almost certainly associated with the eruption of the Huaynaputina volcano in Peru. In the summer of 1601 it rained continuously, there was no sun, and then the frost destroyed all the crops. The failure happened twice more. Three years of crop failures, despite Godunov's attempts to remedy the situation by distributing bread and money, completely demoralized the country. Even the owners of serfs kicked them out because they couldn't feed them. Moreover, the serfs who went on campaigns with the owners and knew how to wield weapons. The state had no choice but to provide them with vacation papers issued in the Kholop order. A new wave of fugitives again moved south. How could refugees settle there without equipment, grain, horses? Many of them engaged in robbery. The winter of 1656 was so severe that two thousand people and a thousand horses died from frost in the Polish army that entered the southern regions of the Russian kingdom. In the Lower Volga region, in the winter of 1778, birds froze in flight and fell dead. During the Russian-Swedish war of 1808-1809. Russian troops crossed the Baltic Sea on ice.