The climate in historical times

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The description of the climate system and the quantification of its natural variability are crucial for assessing anthropogenic climate change and validating climate and biogeochemical models for future projections. Due to the limited spatio-temporal coverage of direct meteorological observations, high-resolution, absolutely dated climate archives are essential for quantifying seasonal to millennial climate variations. Climate models also provide insights into the major processes affecting climate variability over these time scales. However, integrating these two approaches is often challenging due to their differing natures. General Circulation Models (GCMs) utilize spatially resolved data representing real climate variables, with each model run reflecting a possible realization of climate history under specific boundary conditions. In contrast, natural climate archives capture climate variations as they occurred but are typically representative of local conditions. The climate information derived from these archives often relies on proxies, necessitating the establishment of a transfer function to relate them to actual climate variables. This complexity underscores the need for a combined effort to enhance our understanding of climate dynamics and variability.