The glacier advance at the onset of the Little Ice Age in the Alps: New evidence from Mont Miné and Morteratsch glaciers

Abstract

The term ‘Little Ice Age’ (LIA) is classically used to define a period of repeated and extensive glacier advances during the last millennium. In the meanwhile, this term is also used to address the period of relatively low temperatures between the Medieval Climate Anomaly (MCA), or Medieval Warm Period, and present-day warming. The end of the LIA is generally set to the mid or late 1800s CE, however, the published onset dates of the LIA are more variable from the mid 1200s to the late 1500s. At Mont Miné and Morteratsch glaciers, Swiss Alps, we sampled and subsequently analysed detrital as well as in situ tree remnants from the early LIA period. At both glaciers, trees with lifespans of up to about 400 years were buried at various lateral moraine sites. The corresponding advance of both glaciers can be traced from the 1280s until the 1310s. At Morteratsch glacier, this early LIA advance phase culminated likely around 1375 CE. Evidence collected at both glaciers indicates that the ice surfaces were at least c. 12–15 m from the lateral moraine crests deposited during the maximum extent of the LIA. This suggests a similar (though very slightly weaker) magnitude than later LIA advances at our sites. The advances of Mont Miné and Morteratsch glaciers coincide with relatively cool summer temperatures from the late 1200s to the late 1300s. Taken together, the onset of the Little Ice Age in the Alps can be considered to be c. 1260 CE. The Little Ice Age was not a uniform period, but had several phases as can be derived from the records of Alpine glaciers and summer temperatures. We propose a subdivision of the LIA in the European Alps into an early (1260–1380 CE), an intermediate (1380–1575 CE) and a main (1575–1860 CE) phase.