•RESEARCH PAPER• July 2019 Vol.62 No.7: 1138–1150 https://doi.org/10.1007/s11430-018-9340-7 Population-influenced spatiotemporal pattern of natural disaster and social crisis in China, AD1–1910 Shengda ZHANG 1* & David Dian ZHANG 1,2† 1 Department of Geography, The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong 999077, China; 2 School of Geographical Sciences, Guangzhou University, Guangzhou 510006, China Received June 15, 2018; revised November 25, 2018; accepted February 20, 2019; published online Apirl 9, 2019 Abstract Researchers mostly ascribe contemporary natural disaster and the concomitant social crisis to anomalous climate change or global warming. However, whether such a relationship is still valid in long-term historical settings remains doubtful. In this study, data obtained from historical records about natural calamities (flood and drought) and their social impacts (famine, cannibalism, and war) at provincial and decadal scales during AD1–1910 are applied to mathematical statistics such as corre- lation and regression analysis as well as spatial visualization. Also, the role of population in the nexus of meteorological catastrophes and human miseries is investigated. Results show that at the provincial scale, generally there is high consistency among different variables and most of them are clustered in eastern part of China, especially in the north. More in-depth examinations indicate regional disparities that variables account for higher proportion in the south during the later imperial era, which may be attributed to the southward movement of population center. At the decadal scale, drought is the primary contributor to famine and cannibalism, while severe or even out-of-control famine i.e. cannibalism is more likely to incur war than ordinary famine per se. Besides, population growth rate exerts its positive effect on natural hazards and food crises, whereas more wars bring population loss and relieve population stress despite the weak negative association. These findings supplement previous views and confirm that the distributions of disasters in ancient China are affected by population rather than climatic variability, which only determines the occurrence of disaster. Keywords Natural disaster, Social crisis, Population, Spatiotemporal pattern, Historical China Citation: Zhang S, Zhang D D. 2019. Population-influenced spatiotemporal pattern of natural disaster and social crisis in China, AD1–1910. Science China Earth Sciences, 62: 1138–1150, https://doi.org/10.1007/s11430-018-9340-7 1. Introduction Natural disaster is defined as an adverse event that spells property loss and fatality to humankind (Blaikie et al., 2014). In recent decades, weather extremes such as super tropical cyclones (Katrina in 2005, Nargis in 2008, Sandy in 2012, Haiyan in 2013, and Irma in 2017), floods (in southern China in 2010, Thailand in 2011, southwest Russia in 2012, southwest China, southeast Africa and central Europe in 2013, and Balkan Peninsula in 2014) as well as droughts (in sub-Saharan Africa, southeast Australia, and North America, particularly southwestern US) intermittently have great im- pacts on worldwide society. Under the background of global warming, the mainstream view concerning the cause of natural hazard in academia is prevailingly warming-oriented at present. Scientists argue that the rising temperature incurs more and more frequent and severe catastrophes (Helmer and Hilhorst, 2006; van Aalst, 2006; Mann and Emanuel, 2006; Hoyos et al., 2006; Su and Wang, 2007; Drabo and Mbaye, 2011; Emanuel, 2011; Bergholt and Lujala, 2012; IPCC, 2014). However, studies on climate change and natural ca- lamity in ancient times disaccord with the conclusion of warming-induced disaster. Regardless of individual category © Science China Press and Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature 2019 earth.scichina.com link.springer.com SCIENCE CHINA Earth Sciences * Corresponding author (email: sdzhang@hku.hk) † Corresponding author (email: dzhang@gzhu.edu.cn)