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A Bayesian test for the 4.2 ka BP abrupt climatic change event in southeast Europe and southwest Asia using structural time series analysis of paleoclimate data

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Abstract

It has been proposed that there was an abrupt climatic change event around 4.2 ka BP that affected societies and even has been linked to the collapse of empires. Subsequent studies have reached conclusions that both support and contradict the proposed event; yet nevertheless, 4.2 ka BP has now been adopted as the stratigraphic boundary point between the Middle and Upper Holocene. Time series plots of paleoclimate studies that claim to support the abrupt climate change hypothesis show differing temporal patterns so, in this study, we apply the Bayesian structural time series (BSTS) approach using the CausalImpact package to test data from southeast Europe and southwest Asia for which it is claimed that they demonstrate a climatic anomaly around 4.2 ka BP. To do this, each “affected” time series is synthetically reconstructed using “unaffected” series as predictors in a fully Bayesian framework by the BSTS method and then forecast beyond the assumed starting point of the event. A Bayesian hypothesis test is then applied to differences between each synthetic and real time series to test the impact of the event against the forecast data. While our results confirm that some studies cited in support of the 4.2 ka BP event hypothesis do indeed hold true, we also show that a number of other studies fail to demonstrate any credible effect. We observe spatial and data patterning in our results, and we speculate that this climatic deterioration may have been a consequence of an asymmetrical northward expansion or migration of the Northern Hemisphere Hadley cell. Furthermore, we observe that while the signals are generally not credible, types of proxy data from the Mesopotamia region and east are consistent with aeolian dust storms.

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Code availability

All the data used through this study and the code are available through https://github.com/zboraon/causalimpactfor4_2kaBPevent.

Notes

  1. Kiloannum before present, meaning thousand years before 1950 CE.

  2. Within the scope of this study, the term “impact” signifies only a change in the nature of the time series. We do not presuppose the physical cause of that impact, which may be external or created by an extreme climate state as a result of nonlinear interactions within the dynamic climate system itself without any external trigger.

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Acknowledgements

We would like to thank to Ali Kerem Uludaǧ and Ahmet Dinçer Çevik for their inspiring ideas. Dr. Andaç Hamamcı, Dr. Günter Landmann, Prof. Neil Macdonald, and Dr. James Lea read the manuscript and offered corrections. We sincerely thank the three anonymous reviewers for their constructive and helpful comments. All the graphs are plotted through an open source scientific plotting package, Veusz, version 3.0.1 (https://veusz.github.io/). Available data have been collected through web archives or from the corresponding authors. Digitally unavailable data have been digitized through an open source software, Engauge Digitizer, version 10.4 (https://markummitchell.github.io/engauge-digitizer/). All the filtering and interpolation procedure explained in the text are made through a commercial software (MATLAB 8.2, The MathWorks Inc., Natick, MA, 2013).

Funding

The authors received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article except travel funds for Dr. Greaves were provided by the University of Liverpool School of Histories, Languages and Cultures.

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  1. Mühendislik Fak., Jeoloji Böl., Muǧla SK Üniversitesi, 48000, Muǧla, Turkey

    Z. B. Ön & S. Akçer-Ön

  2. İTÜ, Avrasya Yer Bilimleri Enstitüsü, 34469, Ayazaǧa, Istanbul, Turkey

    Z. B. Ön & M. S. Özeren

  3. Department of Archaeology, Classics and Egyptology, University of Liverpool, Liverpool, UK

    A. M. Greaves

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Contributions

Conceptualization: Z.B.Ö., A.M.G., and S.A.Ö. Data collection and literature review: Z.B.Ö. and S.A.Ö. Methodology: Z.B.Ö. and M.S.Ö. Data analysis and interpretation of the results: Z.B.Ö., M.S.Ö., A.M.G., and S.A.Ö. Writing—original draft preparation: Z.B.Ö., M.S.Ö., A.M.G., and S.A.Ö. Writing—review and editing: Z.B.Ö., A.M.G., and M.S.Ö. All the authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.

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Ön, Z.B., Greaves, A.M., Akçer-Ön, S. et al. A Bayesian test for the 4.2 ka BP abrupt climatic change event in southeast Europe and southwest Asia using structural time series analysis of paleoclimate data. Climatic Change 165, 7 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10584-021-03010-6

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