Abstract
December Frosts December, the first month of winter, is often traditionally associated with frosts. Actually, in England, December is not so cold as either January or February, the average temperature at Greenwich over a period of 90 years having been just above 40° F., while the historic frosts of the seventeenth to nineteenth centuries did not usually begin until January. The most notable exception was the intensely cold month of December 1879 in western Europe. In the British Isles the chief characteristic of December is the frequency of rain, which, at most places, is greater than in any other month, though the actual amounts which fall may be less than in October or August. In the French Revolutionary Calendar of 1793, the period November 21-December 20 was the month Frimaire, but this refers rather to the formation of hoar-frost on the ground at night than to the occurrence of temperatures persistently below freezing point. In December, the air still contains a large amount of water vapour, while clear calm nights are cold enough for the ground to fall below 32° F., and under these conditions the deposits of hoar frost may be heavier than they are later in the winter when the temperature is lower.
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Calendar of Nature Topics. Nature 132, 905–906 (1933). https://doi.org/10.1038/132905a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/132905a0