“no glaciers on Mont Blanc in the Middle Ages”

“Kalgoorlie Miner (WA : 1895 – 1954), Wednesday 14 August 1929, page 7

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EUROPEAN GLACIERS.

In the opinion of M. Auguste Bouchayer, scientist and engineer, there were no glaciers in Europe in the Middle Ages. In a recent com-munication to the Dauphine Scien-tific Society, he submits the conclu-sion that since the Middle Ages there has been a considerable fall in the maximum summer tempera-

ture. Consequently winter snows and ice accumulations which were formerly melted in summer are no longer dissipated. Mont Blanc, he points out, is under 16,000 ft. in height, and, as in the thirteenth century the maxi-mum summer temperature was capable of melting snow and ice at a much greater height than that, there could in those times be no eternal snow on its summit. Glaciers, he adds, are dependent for their formation and existence on eternal snows; therefore, there can have been no glaciers on Mont Blanc in the Middle Ages.