...consider this meteorological history.* The world (or at least England's "green and sceptred isle") was warmer 1000 years ago than it it today...by a lot!
Archaeological evidence indicates that the years 950 to 1300 were marked by noticeably warmer temperatures than we experience today, even in the age of "global warming". Meteorologists describe this medieval warm epoch as the "Little Optimum", and they cite it as the explanation of such phenomena as the Viking explosion into Russia, France, Iceland, and the northwestern Atlantic.
The northerly retreat of icebergs and pack ice under the impact of warmer temperatures is a plausible explanation of why Lief Eriksson was able to sail round the top of the Atlantic as far as Newfoundland in or about the year 1000, and why he found vines there. (He didn't name the are "Vinland" as a joke!)
During the "Little Optimum", Edinburgh enjoyed the climate of London, while3 London enjoyed the climate of the Loire Valley in France, a difference of 2 to 4 degrees Fahrenheit -- the equivalent in modern American terms of San Francisco's climate moving north to Seattle.
*Source: Lacey, Robert & Danny Danziger: The Year 1000. Little Brown & Co., London, 1999.
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