Little Ice Age cold linked to vitamin D deficiency in children in northern England

Tooth and bone evidence from an English town suggests that the cold of the Little Ice Age may have left children short of vitamin D. Researchers led by Ellen Kendall of Durham University report in Frontiers in Environmental Archaeology that people buried in North Shields between 1711 and 1829 show recurring signs of deficiency, and some had rickets.

A cold climate and a bone disorder

Rickets is a bone disorder that can develop when the body lacks vitamin D, which is made in the skin on exposure to ultraviolet light. Earlier skeletal studies indicate that rickets became more common in Europe during the 18th and 19th centuries. A frequently cited explanation is industrialisation, as many people lived in polluted cities with limited UV exposure and worked indoors.

The new work asks whether climate also played a part. The Little Ice Age was a period of global cooling lasting from the 13th to the 19th centuries, driven by unusual solar cycles and a series of volcanic eruptions. Volcanic aerosols reflect sunlight and can cool the planet. According to the report, 18 major eruptions in the final 200 years of the period helped drive temperatures in northern Europe down by 2 to 3 degrees Celsius.

What the teeth revealed

The team examined calcium deposition, the way this essential mineral is built into bone and teeth, in the remains of 21 individuals from North Shields. Where vitamin D is lacking, calcium often fails to mineralise fully, which can leave voids in teeth as they form.

The researchers found bands of failed mineralisation in the teeth, a pattern that points to seasonal episodes of deficiency rather than a constant shortfall. Some of the skeletons also showed signs of rickets.

North Shields was a small rural town that had not yet industrialised at the time. That makes air pollution an unlikely main cause, and it strengthens the case for another explanation.

Behaviour as the likely link

Kendall suggests that the severe cold may have changed how people lived through winter. Children may have been kept indoors, or dressed so heavily that little skin was exposed when they went out. Either would reduce the UV light reaching the skin. In Kendall's words, the cold may have added "an extra layer of difficulty" to getting enough sunlight.

Limitations and next steps

The sample is small, at 21 individuals from a single town, so the findings describe one community rather than Europe as a whole. The work also does not directly measure behaviour; the link between cold weather and indoor living or heavy clothing is an inference.

Kendall stresses that climate was one factor among many. Gender roles, diet and pollution all shaped vitamin D status in this period, and these are hard to separate in historical populations. Larger samples from several regions, and comparison of rural and urban sites across the cooling period, would help show how much climate contributed alongside the better-known effects of industrialisation.

For researchers in bioarchaeology and environmental history, the study offers an example of how tooth microstructure can record seasonal stress, and how past climate shifts may have affected health through everyday behaviour.

Source: Little Ice Age cooling in Europe may have raised the risk of rickets (Science News, 5 November 2026).

Image: AI-generated illustration.