Wait...................What?............

     The world was entering a period of environmental change.  In Europe, this was evidenced by rising sea levels and the emergence of malaria in the North Sea region.  While in Asia from the start of the fourth century sharply reduced salinity in the Aral Sea, markedly different vegetation on the steppes (evident from high-resolution pollen analyses) and new patterns of glacier advances in Tian Shan range all show fundamental shifts in global climatic change.

-Peter Frankopa,  The Silk Roads:  A New History Of The World