Thanks, Robt-that is fascinating info-correct me if I’m wrong, but didn’t the Maunder Minimum occur during the Little Ice Age? I don’t like the thought of that-an ice age winter isn’t something I want to live in-even in Texas...
It was. But things aren't quite so “pretty” and convenient when you look at all of the interfaces and temperatures.
The Little Ice Age can only be identified by proxies and assumptions based on what people wrote down and what they did: died in Greenland from starvation - but how long did they “almost” survive while starving their sheep and cattle? Growing grapes in mid England is obvious from the tax records earlier during the Medieval Warming Period - and not during the Little Ice Age is clear evidence, but when did one stop and the other began?
The Medieval Warming Period was (broadly speaking) peaking 1150 through 1300, but that's a broad peak with high and low years (Whether weather happens whenever, at last you all die!) showing up now and then. The LIA was at its worst around 1600 - 1700 (1650 is a working average), but it certainly wasn't just limited to those years. Some writers claim we did not get out of the LIA until 1850 for example.
And there's the whole separate conflict about whether or not sunspots are a good proxy for earth's climate at all.
Regardless, as you point out, right in the middle of the Maunder Minimum - when we KNOW flat out that there were NO sunspots at all for many dozen year - the average weather over the entire planet was very, very cold compared to the hundreds of years right before and right after the Maunder Minimum.
Sobering thoughts for today's world.