Climate in Ancient Rome and the Han Dynasty

In his book, "The Fate of Rome," Prof. Kyle Harper argues that much of the history of the Roman Empire can be attributed to climate: the period known as the "Roman Climate Optimum," around 200 B.C. to 150 A.D., neatly encapsulates the rise of the Roman Republic through its transition into Empire until the beginning of its decline during the age of the Antonines.

The Han Dynasty in China follows almost exactly the same timeline from its founding in 202 B.C. to its final collapse in 220 A.D. If climate was a leading cause of Rome's rise to imperium as well as its eventually humbling, and if many of the causal factors of climate change are global, then can it be that similar patterns of climate change led to the rise and fall of the Han Dynasty?

To answer this question, we turn to Prof. Zhu Kezhen and his seminal 1972 paper...

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