Severe climate change kick-started civilisation, says British scientist

SEVERE climate change thousands of years ago may have led to the birth of civilisation, an expert said yesterday.

Global warming is seen as one of the greatest threats facing the human race but between 4,000 and 6,000 years ago, an increase in harsh, arid conditions may have played a key role in the rise of the first major civilisations, according to Dr Nick Brooks, from the University of East Anglia.

At the time, natural fluctuations in the Earth’s orbit brought about a climate shift, causing regions where humans previously enjoyed a fruitful hunter-gatherer existence to dry up.

As the environment became hostile, people gravitated to water sources and started to settle in stable communities, Dr Brooks told the BA (British Association) Festival of Science, taking place in Norwich.

These provided the seeds for the first large early civilisations in Egypt, Iraq, south Asia, China and the northern part of South America.

Speaking at the University of East Anglia yesterday, Mr Brooks said: “Civilisation was a last resort — a means of organising society and food production and distribution, in the face of deteriorating environmental conditions.”

It led to a host of evils, including greater social inequality, conflict and tyranny, said Dr Brooks.

* The Mediterranean region — particularly the area around Greece — could be hit by a major tsunami before the end of the century, a scientist said yesterday.

According to data presented at the First European Conference on Earthquake Engineering and Seismology, being held in Geneva this week, a major tsunami occurs in the Mediterranean about every 136 years. The last one happened in the south Aegean sea in 1956, killing four people and causing widespread damage.