A glimpse of an extremely warm world - lessons from the Early Paleogene

As the world warms, the Earth system moves towards a climate state without societal precedent. This challenges future predictions, as climate models need to be tested and calibrated with real-world data.  One strategy for assessing the effects of greenhouse forcing on climate is to turn to Earth’s past, where changes in climate are stored in the form of sedimentological, paleontological, isotopic, and geochemical proxies. We compile global proxy data across multiple global warming events of the Early Paleogene (66-47.8 Ma) – a period of extreme warmth suggested as a possible analogue for worst-case scenarios of future global warming. We take a novel, multi-proxy approach where we include information on precipitation intermittency and intensity, and integrate the proxies into climate types. The data show surprising hydrological shifts that started well before and persisted well beyond the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum – the warmest period of the Cenozoic Era and the focus of much of t..., This dataset was collected by compiling published literature on terrestrial temperature and precipitation during the Early Paleogene (66-49 Ma). Mean annual precipitation (MAP) and temperature (MAT) values were used to assign a climate type with a distinct range of MAP and MAT values. Where quantitative information was not available, qualitative proxies were assigned a range of potential MAT and MAP values based on comparison to modern environments. For a more detailed explanation of the methods, please see the published article's supplementary information. , , # The Early Paleogene: A glimpse of an extremely warm world

[https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.r4xgxd2kg](https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.r4xgxd2kg)

This dataset contains mean annual precipitation (MAP) in millimeters per year, mean annual temperature (MAT) in degrees celsius, precipitation intermittency, temperature seasonality, precipitation and temperature proxies used, an associated climate type, an uncertainty value from 1-5, and a geochronology method column for terrestrial proxy locations across the globe from 66-47.8 million years ago. The proxy locations were assigned a climate type with a distinct range of MAP and MAT values based on the data which was originally compiled from published literature. Climate types are given using acronyms described in the manuscript and included in the \"Climate type table\" sheet. The original data sources are also included in the \"Temperature source\" and \"Precipitation source\" columns. Paleolatitude and paleolongitude were calculated in QGIS after t...