the.com/interglacial
earth exhales for a few thousand years, and civilization sneaks in during the breath.
means a warm stretch between two ice ages, when glaciers retreat and the climate settles into something livable.
from from latin inter (between) plus glacialis (icy) — coined by geologists mapping the rhythm of pleistocene ice sheets advancing and retreating over millennia.
current onethe holocene, running about 11,700 years so far
typical lengthinterglacials usually last 10,000 to 30,000 years
agriculture's timingevery human civilization arose during this one warm gap
next ice ageorbital cycles suggest one is technically overdue