Study on the extremely cold winter of 1670 over the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River

摘要

The snow-cover days over the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River(MLRYR) in the winter of 1670 were extracted from Chinese historical documents. By these records, the winter temperature anomalies(compared to the mean of 1961–1990) recorded at seven meteorological stations and the regional mean winter temperature were estimated. The results show that:(1) There was an average of about 30 snow-cover days over the MLRYR region in 1670, ranging from 11–20 days in Shanghai and eastern Zhejiang to 51–60 days in eastern Hunan Province. The snow-cover days averaged about 40 days in Anqing and Nancheng, and ranged from 30 to 40 days in Quzhou, Jingdezhen, and Nanchang; and(2) the regional mean winter temperature in 1670 was estimated to be approximately 4.0 °C lower than that of 1961–1990. The maximum negative anomaly of 5.6 °C occurred in Nanchang and the minimum anomaly of-2.8 °C was detected in Quzhou. Both of these were lower than that of the coldest winter during the instrumental observation period of 1951–2010. This research could not only provide a method to estimate historical climate extremes, but also provide a background to understand the recent instrumentally climate extremes.