Editing Little Ice Age (section)

==== Cultural responses ====
Historians have argued that cultural responses to the consequences of the Little Ice Age in Europe consisted of violent [[scapegoating]].<ref name=":1">{{cite journal |last1=Oster |first1=Emily |year=2004 |title=Witchcraft, weather and economic growth in Renaissance Europe |journal=[[Journal of Economic Perspectives]] |volume=18 |issue=1 |pages=215–228 |citeseerx=10.1.1.526.7789 |doi=10.1257/089533004773563502 |jstor=3216882 |s2cid=22483025 |ssrn=522403}}</ref><ref name=":2">{{cite book |last=Behringer |first=Wolfgang |title=A Cultural History of Climate |publisher=Wiley |year=2009 |isbn=978-0-7456-4529-2 |pages=121–167 |language=en |chapter=Cultural Consequences of the Little Ice Age}}</ref><ref name=":3">{{Cite book |chapter=The Little Ice Age |title=Global Crisis: War, Climate Change, & Catastrophe in the Seventeenth Century |last=Parker |first=Geoffrey |publisher=Yale University Press |year=2013 |isbn=978-0-300-20863-4 |pages=3–25 }}</ref><ref name="Behringer1999">{{cite journal |last1=Behringer |first1=Wolfgang |date=September 1999 |title=Climatic change and witch-hunting: the impact of the Little Ice Age on mentalities |url=https://link.springer.com/article/10.1023/A:1005554519604 |journal=[[Climatic Change (journal)|Climatic Change]] |volume=43 |issue=1 |pages=335–351 |doi=10.1023/A:1005554519604 |bibcode=1999ClCh...43..335B |s2cid=189869470 |access-date=11 November 2023}}</ref><ref name=":5">{{cite journal |last1=Lehmann |first1=Hartmut |year=1988 |title=The Persecution of Witches as Restoration of Order: The Case of Germany, 1590s–1650s |journal=[[Central European History]] |volume=21 |issue=2 |pages=107–121 |doi=10.1017/S000893890001270X |s2cid=145501088}}</ref> The prolonged cold, dry periods brought drought upon many European communities and resulted in poor crop growth, poor livestock survival, and increased activity of pathogens and disease vectors.<ref name=":02">{{cite journal |doi=10.2307/203592 |pmid=11617361 |jstor=203592 |title=Climatic Variability and the European Mortality Wave of the Early 1740s |journal=The Journal of Interdisciplinary History |volume=15 |issue=1 |pages=1–30 |last1=Post |first1=John D. |year=1984}}</ref> Disease intensified under the same conditions that unemployment and economic difficulties arose: prolonged cold, dry seasons. Disease and unemployment generated a lethal positive feedback loop.<ref name=":02" /> Although the communities had some contingency plans, such as better crop mixes, emergency grain stocks, and international food trade, they did not always prove effective.<ref name=":1" /> Communities often lashed out via violent crimes, including robbery and murder. Accusations of sexual offenses also increased, such as [[adultery]], [[bestiality]], and [[rape]].<ref name=":2" /> Europeans sought explanations for the famine, disease, and social unrest that they were experiencing, and they blamed the innocent. Evidence from several studies indicate that increases in violent actions against marginalized groups, which were held responsible for the Little Ice Age, overlap with the years of particularly cold, dry weather.<ref name=":3" /><ref name=Behringer1999/><ref name=":1" />

One example of the violent scapegoating occurring during the Little Ice Age was the resurgence of [[witch-hunt|witchcraft trials]]. Oster (2004) and Behringer (1999) argue that the resurgence was brought by the climatic decline. Prior to the Little Ice Age, witchcraft was considered an insignificant crime, and victims (the supposed witches) were rarely accused.<ref name=Behringer1999/> But beginning in the 1380s, just as the Little Ice Age began, European populations began to link magic and weather-making.<ref name=Behringer1999/> The first systematic witch hunts began in the 1430s, and by the 1480s, it was widely believed that witches should be held accountable for poor weather.<ref name=Behringer1999/> Witches were blamed for direct and indirect consequences of the Little Ice Age: livestock epidemics, cows that gave too little milk, late frosts, and unknown diseases.<ref name=":2" /> In general, the number of witchcraft trials rose as the temperature dropped, and trials decreased when temperature increased.<ref name=":1" /><ref name=Behringer1999/> The peaks of witchcraft persecutions overlap with the hunger crises that occurred in 1570 and 1580, the latter lasting a decade.<ref name=Behringer1999/> The trials targeted primarily poor women, many of them widows. Not everybody agreed that witches should be persecuted for weather-making, but such arguments focused primarily not upon whether witches existed but upon whether witches had the capability to control the weather.<ref name=Behringer1999/><ref name=":1" /> The [[Catholic Church]] in the [[Early Middle Ages]] argued that witches could not control the weather because they were mortals, not God, but by the mid-13th century, most people agreed with the idea that witches could control natural forces.<ref name=":1" />

Jewish populations were also blamed for climatic deterioration during the Little Ice Age.<ref name=":2" /><ref name=":5" /> The Western European states experienced waves of [[anti-Semitism]], directed against the main religious minority in their otherwise Christian societies.<ref name=":2" /> There was no direct link made between Jews and the weather; they were blamed only for indirect consequences such as disease.<ref name=":2" /> Outbreaks of the [[Black Death]] were often blamed on Jews. In Western European cities during the 1300s, [[Persecution of Jews during the Black Death|Jewish populations were murdered]] to stop the spread of the plague.<ref name=":2" /> Rumors spread that Jews were either poisoning wells themselves, or telling [[leprosy|lepers]] to poison the wells.<ref name=":2" /> To escape persecution, some Jews converted to Christianity, while others migrated to the [[Ottoman Empire]], [[Italy in the Middle Ages|Italy]] or the [[Holy Roman Empire]], where they experienced greater toleration.<ref name=":2" />

Some populations blamed the cold periods and the resulting famine and disease during the Little Ice Age on a general divine displeasure.<ref name=":3" /> Particular groups took the brunt of the burden in attempts to cure it.<ref name=":3" /> In Germany, regulations were imposed upon activities such as gambling and [[alcohol law|drinking]], which disproportionately affected the lower class and women were forbidden from showing their knees.<ref name=":3" /> Other regulations affected the wider population, such as prohibiting dancing, sexual activities and moderating food and drink intake.<ref name=":3" /> In Ireland, Catholics blamed the [[Reformation in Ireland|Reformation]] for the bad weather. The ''[[Annals of Loch Cé]]'', in its entry for 1588, describes a midsummer snowstorm as "a wild apple was not larger than each stone of it" and blames it on the presence of a "wicked, heretical, bishop in Oilfinn", the [[Protestant]] [[Bishop of Elphin]], [[John Lynch (bishop of Elphin)|John Lynch]].<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://celt.ucc.ie/published/T100010B/text012.html |title=Part 12 of ''Annals of Loch Cé'' |website=Corpus of Electronic Texts |publisher=University College Cork}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=qcCxCwAAQBAJ&pg=PA36 |title=Reformations in Ireland: Tradition and Confessionalism, 1400–1690 |first=Samantha A. |last=Meigs |date= 1997 |publisher=Springer |via=Google Books |isbn=978-1-349-25710-2 }}</ref>