Socio-economic impacts on flooding: a 4000-year history of the Yellow River, China

Abstract

We analyze 4000-year flood history of the lower Yellow River and the history of agricultural development in the middle river by investigating historical writings and quantitative time series data of environmental changes in the river basin. Flood dynamics are characterized by positive feedback loops, critical thresholds of natural processes, and abrupt transitions caused by socio-economic factors. Technological and organizational innovations were dominant driving forces of the flood history. The popularization of iron plows and embarkment of the lower river in the 4th century BC initiated a positive feedback loop on levee breaches. The strength of the feedback loop was enhanced by farming of coarse-sediment producing areas, steep hillslope cultivation, and a new river management paradigm, and finally pushed the flood frequency to its climax in the seventeenth century. The co-evolution of river dynamics and Chinese society is remarkable, especially farming and soil erosion in the middle river, and central authority and river management in the lower river.

Fig. 1

Topographical view based on Shuttle Radar Topography Mission 90-m resolution data showing the locations and frequencies of flood events in the lower Yellow River in historical times. Statistics derived from records in The Chronicle of the Yellow River (Shen et al. 1935) and The Chronicle of Events of the Yellow River (Yellow River Conservancy Commission 2001). The number of floods at each location combine all historical records of “overspill,” “breach,” “avulsion,” “flood,” and “river breached” for different channels in their active periods. The prefecture of Kaifeng was struck by most disasters; 84 floods. Colors of the symbols correspond to the five distinguished periods in the section “History of the Yellow River Floods”

Fig. 2

Changes in the course of the lower Yellow River in historical times. The channel belts are traced from SRTM data in combination with Historical Atlas of China (Tan 1982). 1 Shanjing River, 2 Yugong River, 3 Hanzhi River, 4 Eastern Han River, 5 Northern Course, 6 Eastern Course, 7 Old Yellow River, 8 Present-day Yellow River. Colors correspond with distinguished period, and the thickness of lines indicates the period of the river course existence, not the width of the channel belt

Fig. 3

a, b Time series of the numbers of floods and river management activities in the lower Yellow River for 2500 bc–2000 ad. Statistics are based on records in The Chronicle of the Yellow River (Shen et al. 1935) and The Chronicle of Events of the Yellow River (Yellow River Conservancy Commission 2001). The number of floods at each location combine all historical records of “overspill,” “breach,” “avulsion,” “flood,” and “river breached” for different channels in their active periods. River management activities sum the historical records of “construction” and “regulation”. c Changes in population of the middle Yellow River and the shifts of warfare and prosperous periods in the Chinese society for 2500 bc–2000 ad. Population counts before 1953 are farming populations estimated on the basis of historical household registration data, and thus underestimate actual population (Yang ; Ge et al. 2002)

Fig. 4

The geography of the study area, showing the Yellow River and tributaries. Important features in the drainage basin are illustrated; the extend of the river basin (gray shade), the location of the Loess Plateau, the position of the Great Wall, the boundary between the forest and steppe ecotones and the two canals

Fig. 5

Changes of the northern boundary of the farming-grazing transitional zone over 1500 bc–2000 ad (modified after Zhang 1996). For 3500 years, the boundary has moved 300–400 km in the northwest direction. After the thirteenth century, the boundary permanently crossed most area of the coarse-sediment producing area (CSA) of the Loess Plateau. The present-day land-use boundary is 150- to 200-km north of the northern boundary of the forest-steppe ecotone

Fig. 6

a Planview of the Lower Yellow River topography; b, c 3D perspectives and d cross sections, all based on Shuttle Radar Topography Mission 90-m resolution data. The cross sections intersect the channel belts of the abandoned Old Yellow River and the present-day river, showing the abandoned channel belt of the Old Yellow River is still 10 m super-elevated above the outer floodplains; the super-elevation of the present-day channel belt on the alluvial fan is over 10 m