From plague to pirate raids, the mysterious disappearance of Norse settlers in the 14th Century has been linked to many factors. Now, researchers have discovered an additional element that might have helped seal their fate: drought.
. For the new study, they extracted the remains of long-dead microbes from the layers of mud on the lake bed, which they dated with radiocarbon. By tracking changes in bacterial chemistry through time, they reconstructed past temperatures.
The data on water availability told a different story. To examine this feature, the team looked at hydrogen isotopes in the remains of plants buried in the lake mud. When plants lose water to evaporation in dry weather, their leaves become enriched in a heavy hydrogen isotope, deuterium. By measuring the deuterium content of leaf remains from layers in the lake mud, the researchers found that.
Several severe droughts have struck Greenland in recent years. “Around 2015 it was very dry—we had rain in June and then the next came in August,” says Elna Jensen, who farms land near Narsaq, Greenland, close to the lake Zhao’s team studied. It’s also important to appreciate that the Norse did attempt to adapt to the changing environment on Greenland, McGovern says. Archaeological evidence shows they began to consume more marine food, including seal meat, as farming became harder.
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