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Climate change caused by volcanic eruptions has been linked to the downfall of the Ptolemaic dynasty. Egypt became a province of the Roman Empire in 30 BC:
A series of volcanic eruptions may have helped bring about the downfall of the last Egyptian dynasty 2,000 years ago.
By suppressing the monsoons that swelled the Nile River each summer, triggering flooding that supported the region's agriculture, the eruptions probably helped usher in an era of periodic revolts [open, DOI: 10.1038/s41467-017-00957-y] [DX], researchers report online October 17 in Nature Communications. That upheaval ultimately doomed the dynasty that ruled Egypt's Ptolemaic Kingdom for nearly 300 years until the death of Cleopatra.
[...] Manning and colleagues pored over historical texts from Ptolemaic Egypt, comparing periods of unrest with the volcanic record in the ice cores. Eruptions coincided with the onset of many recorded revolts. Political instability, famine and drought may have come to a head around 44 B.C., when Italy's Mount Etna erupted explosively. The Ptolemaic dynasty soon came to a close in 30 B.C. with Cleopatra's suicide.
Also at Live Science and The Washington Post (archive).
(Score: 3, Informative) by Runaway1956 on Saturday October 21 2017, @02:33AM (1 child)
Maybe. I have read other articles which attribute dynastic changes to climate changes. China lead the list of dynasty changes during climate change, if I recall correctly.
There may or may not be civil unrest before or even after a dynasty change, and there may or may not be valid reasons for unrest. But, when people start to go hungry, crazy stuff happens. If families start burying starved children, there are definitely changes in the wind.
I haven't read TFA, maybe the authors know what they are talking about, maybe they don't. But two or more years of serious crop failure may easily lead to a dynasty change. Imagine the US if corn and wheat both failed two to ten years running. The place would be a madhouse, maybe worse than what we read of the Soviet Union. Maybe as bad as North Korea. Hungry people aren't necessarily reasonable people.
“Take me to the Brig. I want to see the “real Marines”. – Major General Chesty Puller, USMC
(Score: 0, Troll) by khallow on Saturday October 21 2017, @03:37AM
Yea, we'd be whining about how we had to pay more for Ukrainian wheat or whatever. Developed world has this stuff covered. It's places like Africa and Asia that would have the real problems with a global famine.