LETTER How the aggressiveness of rainfalls in the Mediterranean lands is enhanced by climate change Nazzareno Diodato & Gianni Bellocchi & Nunzio Romano & Giovanni Battista Chirico # Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2011 Abstract Rainfall and overland flow are fundamental processes for Earth’ s ecosystems but can also be land disturbing forces, particularly when triggered by extreme hydro- meteorological events. Examples of these extremes are rainstorms and related phenomena due to rainfall aggressiveness. They produce high-impact land processes such as soil erosion and nutrient losses. Economic and social consequences of these processes can be quite severe. However, hydrological extremes and their environmental implications are still poorly understood, particularly if analyzed in the context of climate change. Here, we analyze a 300 year long times series of historical rainfall patterns across the Mediterranean in the last three centuries and we investigate changes in the erosive forcing as related to climate changes. Our results show that the erosive forcing increased towards the end of the Little Ice Age (~1850) over western and central Mediterranean and that has been increasing in the recent warming period at low Mediterranean latitudes, due to a higher frequency of intensive storms. Such increased concentrated precipitation may lead to an intensification of land degradation processes triggered by soil erosion and transport across a range of scales from hillslopes to small catchments. 1 Introduction Extreme rainfalls are the most accountable climatic agents triggering soil erosion processes worldwide (Hilton et al. 2008), causing serious land degradation and environmental Climatic Change (2011) 108:591–599 DOI 10.1007/s10584-011-0216-4 N. Diodato : G. Bellocchi Met European Research Observatory, CEOP(GEWEX) Network—World Climate Research Programme, via Monte Pino snc, 82100 Benevento, Italy G. Bellocchi Grassland Ecosystem Research Unit, French National Institute of Agricultural Research, avenue du Brézet 234, 63000 Clermont-Ferrand, France N. Romano : G. B. Chirico (*) Department of Agricultural Engineering, University of Naples Federico II, Via Università 100, Portici, Naples 80055, Italy e-mail: gchirico@unina.it Received: 21 March 2011 / Accepted: 9 August 2011 /Published online: 27 August 2011