Marine Resource Use During Times of Climatic Adversity: Subsistence Amelioration in Argyll, c 1650-1815

The next Friends of Argyll Estates Archives seminar will take place online via zoom on Friday 16 January 2026 at 14:30 UK time when Cianna Devitt & Sophia Chapple will present ‘Marine Resource Use During Times of Climatic Adversity: Subsistence Amelioration in Argyll, c 1650-1815’.

 

This study examines how land and maritime regimes in operation in Argyll and its adjacent islands interacted with one another during the early modern period (1650-1815), especially in terms of the effects of climatic adversity and the advance of commercially driven systems of exchange. As the region witnessed an above-average incidence of storms, lower sea-surface temperatures, prolonged winters, and shorter growing seasons, we have sought to assess how resource use, both on land and at sea, was altered to adapt to these shifts. Moreover, the analysis highlights how shifting demands from seaborne commerce reconfigured subsistence economies and terrestrial regimes of tenure and exploitation. In this talk, we seek to demonstrate that terrestrial and marine worlds must be understood as interdependent spheres, whose interactions could simultaneously enable and constrain the resilience of early modern coastal communities.

 

Cianna Devitt is a second-year PhD student at Trinity College Dublin. Her doctoral research is focused on the evolution of seaweed harvesting along the Atlantic coasts of Ireland and Scotland in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, with particular reference to the rise and fall of the kelp trade. Cianna is also a part-time research assistant with the ERC-funded 4Oceans project, where she has contributed to a global literature review of marine history covering the period of 1000-1900 CE.

 

Sophia Chapple is a third year PhD student at Trinity College Dublin. She is one of four PhD students on the Life in the Currents Project, which is seeking to build historical ocean models in order to better understand the interplay between marine extraction, ecosystem dynamics, and global climate change. Her emphasis is on the human experience of this global climatic cooling phenomenon, and in what capacity coastal communities turned to the sea to alleviate terrestrial subsistence pressures.

 

The seminar will be given on Zoom.

 

You can book your place for the seminar in the online shop at www.argyllestatesarchives.org. Members need to be logged in to access their membership benefit (free attendance).

 

Alternatively, you can book your place by emailing friends@argyllestatesarchives.org.  

Image: Argyll Estates Archives ref. 1209/655 Inveraray Harbour