Height and Climate in Mediterranean Spain, 1850–1949 for the Last Few Decades, Height Has Become Increas- Ingly Popular As a Proxy for Changes in Human Well-Being

Journal of Interdisciplinary History, XLIX:2 (Autumn, 2018), 247–277.

Gregori Galofré-Vilà, José-Miguel Martínez-Carrión, and Javier Puche Height and Climate in Mediterranean Spain, 1850–1949 For the last few decades, height has become increasingly popular as a proxy for changes in human well-being. Height measures the cumulative effect of the nutrients available throughout the growth period after allowing for physical maintenance, work, and the impact of man-made and natural environments. Genes are important at the individual level, but environmental conditions from conception to maturity determine which or how much genetic potential is realized during development. Stature is a particularly use- ful indicator in historical research when data about more conven- tional or modern indicators are lacking. Anthropometric historians draw attention to the relationship between height and a wide range of social, economic, and environmental factors, such as urban development, diseases, and food prices. Yet, although historians emphasize some of the causes for changes in stature over the long term, they have done little research into climate. This neglect is surprising given the suggestions in the literature concerning the importance of climatic changes. For instance, Floud et al. write, “Nutritional status . . . varies with individual circum- stances. Whether the diet of a particular individual is nutritionally adequate depends, in part, on his or her level of physical activity,

Gregori Galofré-Vilà is Postdoctoral Researcher, University of Oxford, and Postdoctoral Researcher, University of Bocconi. He is the author of “Growth and Maturity: A Quantitative Systematic Review and Network Analysis in Anthropometric History,” Economics & Human Biology, XXVIII (2018), 107–118. José-Miguel Martínez-Carrión is Professor of Economic History, Universidad de Murcia. He is the author of “Stature, Welfare and Economic Growth in Nineteenth-century Spain,” in Roderick Floud et al. (eds.), Health, Mortality and the Standard of Living in Europe and North American since 1700 (Cheltenham, 2014), 443–460. Javier Puche is Lecturer of Economic History, Universidad de Zaragoza. He is co-author of, with María Isabel Ayuda, “Determinants of Height and Biological Inequality in Mediterranean Spain, 1859–1967,” Economics & Human Biology, XXV (2014), 101–109. The authors thank Bernard Harris, Aravinda Guntupalli, Eric Schneider, Salvador Calatayud Giner, Samuel Garrido, and a reviewer for valuable comments. They acknowledge ﬁnancial support from HAR2016-76814-C2-2-P (MICINN-FEDER-EU) and ECO2015-65582 (MEC-MICINN). © 2018 by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and The Journal of Interdisciplinary History, Inc., https://doi.org/10.1162/jinh_a_01268

Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/jinh_a_01268 by guest on 24 September 2021 248 | GALOFRÉ-VILÀ, MARTÍNEZ-CARRIÓN, AND PUCHE the climate of the region in which he or she lives, and the extent of his or her exposure to various diseases.”1 A small number of empirical studies have examined the effect of climate on height in the long term. Komlos found that an increase in temperature and a decline in summer and autumn rainfall during the late eighteenth century in France led to height increases. Baten found that warm winters during the eighteenth century led to height increases in Bavaria (Germany), whereas cold years had the opposite effect. However, until recently, long-term empirical evidence has been unavailable due to the scarcity of climatic data. Indeed, the two aforementioned studies had only crude meteorological data at their disposal. Baten compensated by using data about winter temperatures in the Swiss Alps between 1725 and 1795, and Komlos by using winter temperatures from Paris between 1675 and 1715, together with English and Swiss temperature data for the period from 1670 to 1770.2 The lack of climatic data becomes more pronounced the further back in time we go. For instance, Steckel and Rose in the Backbone of History attempted to link cross-sectional variations in health gleaned from skeletal remains with such site characteristics as settlement size, topography, and climate in North and Central America throughout the last 7,000 years. They found, however, that despite prima facie grounds for viewing climate as an inﬂuenc- ing factor on health, their research did not support the idea: “Somewhat to our surprise, climatic distinctions were completely irrelevant for the health index . . . . This result does not mean that climate was everywhere irrelevant for health, but only that within the sample under study, our measure of health (the health index) was not affected by [the] climatic distinctions we were able to make (tropical, sub-tropical and temperate) for the pre-Columbian sites. We therefore eliminated climate from further study, but plan to revisit this topic in later research.” However, recent research by

1 Roderick Floud et al., The Changing Body: Health, Nutrition, and Human Development in the Western World since 1700 (New York, 2011), 41. 2 John Komlos, “An Anthropometric History of Early-Modern France,” European Review of Economic History, VII (2003), 159–189; Joerg Baten, “Climate, Grain Production and Nutri- tional Status in Southern Germany during the XVIIIth Century,” Journal of European Economic History, XXX (2001), 9–47. For the scarcity of suitable historical meteorological data, see Melissa Dell, Benjamin Jones, and Benjamin Olken, “What Do We Learn from the Weather? The New Climate Economy Literature,” Journal of Economic Literature, LII (2014), 740–798.

Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/jinh_a_01268 by guest on 24 September 2021 HEIGHT AND CLIMATE IN SPAIN | 249 Galofré-Vilà, Hinde, and Guntupalli in England, or Koepke and Baten in Europe, also failed to identify a clear relationship between climate and stature throughout the last 2,000 years.3 The works outlined above are limited in their ability to explore the relationship between height and climate in an unadjusted and descriptive way, given their crude measures of climate. With the beneﬁt of more complex methods and robust climatic data, this article is able to explore the effect of weather and climate in great detail, controlling for a list of covariates in height statistics. We deﬁne weather as the monthly or seasonal temperature and rainfall in a particular locality and climate as the general character of the temperature and rainfall that accumulated during longer periods of time (several years or decades). The area under analysis is the region of València in Mediterranean Spain between 1850 and 1949.

VALÈNCIA AS A CASE STUDY Agriculture Throughout the last century, Spain lagged behind the other European economies; the country’s slow growth was accompanied by a delay in structural change. In 1887, about 72.3 percent of the male population was still employed in agriculture, despite the existence of regional differences. This ﬁgure was lower in the Mediterranean area (62.8 percent) and higher in the interior (76.2 percent) and north (77.8 percent). These ratios fell substantially during the course of four decades, after which agriculture accounted for half of the male labor force in 1930, being below the mean in the Mediterranean area (38.8 percent) and

3 Richard Steckel and Jerome C. Rose, The Backbone of History: Health and Nutrition in the Western Hemisphere (New York, 2002), 567. Steckel and Rose’s health index summarizes community health by converting skeletal data into specific rates of morbidity, expressed in the frequency and severity of skeletal lesions. This index is graded on a scale of 0 (the most severe) to 100 (no lesions or deficiencies). Stature was known for only 3,049 individuals out of 12,520. Years later, Steckel also acknowledged that he and Rose “estimated a sequence of regressions that examined the statistical connection between health and various ecological categories like climate, size of settlement, diet, terrain, and vegetation. Climate—as measured in categories of tropical, subtropical, and temperate—bore no relevance to the health index. This result was unanticipated and bears further study with more refined measures.” See Richard Steckel, “Biological Measures of the Standard of Living,” Journal of Economic Perspectives, XXII (2008), 148. Galofré-Vilà, Andrew Hinde, and Aravinda Meera Guntupalli, “Heights across the Last 2000 Years in England,” Research in Economic History, XXXIII (2018), 67–98; Nikola Koepke and Joerg Baten, “The Biological Standard of Living in Europe during the Last Two Millennia,” European Review of Economic History, IX (2005), 61–95.

Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/jinh_a_01268 by guest on 24 September 2021 250 | GALOFRÉ-VILÀ, MARTÍNEZ-CARRIÓN, AND PUCHE above it in the interior and Andalusian regions (53.2 percent and 58.8 percent, respectively).4 Table 1 shows the distribution of cultivated land in the region of València. Alacant had abundant vineyards; Castelló specialized in cereals (rice being the most salient crop), pulses, and fruit trees; and València primarily cultivated fruit trees and vines, along with tubers and roots. Cereals and pulses were dominant in all of the provinces, accounting for more than 40 percent of the total land in 1922 until c. 1930 when oranges and rice became the main crops. In València, the major landowners made the shift to orange trees, focusing on marginal rain-fed areas. Yet in regions of Castelló, the smaller proprietors were responsible for the expansion into oranges; they planted trees in gardens and orchards, investing in irrigation and creating extensive plantations as long-term investments in the citrus market. Hence, given its climatic conditions and geography, Valencian agriculture was by no means a monoculture. Its most outstanding feature was the co-existence of diverse productive specializations.5 Certain crops and developments were the result of external shocks. During the second half of the nineteenth century, the ravages of the phylloxera (a pest in grapevines) boosted the French demand for wine, resulting in a rise in the number of vineyards around the Mediterranean. This boom was particularly striking in rain-fed areas of València, which, by 1882, accounted for 60 percent of Spain’swine exports. Hence, regional specialization in agriculture explains the Valencian ability to take advantage of the favorable climatic and economic conditions for crops of high value, which in turn, led to industrial development, agricultural or otherwise. As a case in point, Castelló de la Plana and Oriola developed a hemp industry, and Alcoi or Elx became an important market for cloth and footwear.6

4 Data from the population working in agriculture are from James Simpson, Spanish Agri- culture: The Long Siesta, 1765–1965 (New York, 1995), 54. For the influence of agriculture on GDP, see Prados de la Escosura, El Progreso Económico de España (1850–2000) (Madrid, 2003). 5 Samuel Garrido, “El conreu del taronger a la Plana de Castelló: Agricultura comercial, Propietat pagesa i Treballas salariat (1850–1930),” Estudis d’Història Agrària, XIII (1999), 201–227; Salvador Calatayud, “Desarrollo agrario e Industrialización: Crecimiento y Crisis en la economía Valenciana del siglo XX,” Historia Contemporánea, XLII (2011), 105–147; idem and Jesús Millán, “Las vías simultáneas del capitalismo agrario valenciano,” in Ramón Garrabou (ed.), Sombras de progreso: Las huellas de la historia agraria (Barcelona, 2010), 199–229. 6Thefirst European appearance of the phylloxera plague was in 1868, affecting the French regions of Burdeos and Gard; it rapidly spread into southern France during the next five years, lasting until 1885. See Juan Piqueras Haba, “La filoxera en España y su difusión espacial: 1878–1926,” Cuadernos de Geografía, LXXVII (2005), 106–107.

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Table 1 Distribution of the Cultivated Land in the Provinces of Alacant, Castelló, and València (in Hectares)

ALACANT CASTELLÓ VALÈNCIA 1886– 1903– 1886– 1903– 1886– 1903– 1860 1890 1912 1922 1860 1890 1912 1922 1860 1890 1912 1922

NONIRRIGATED AREAS Cereals and pulses 108,123 14,514 56,568 114,909 52,885 79,695 108,995 107,014 84,324 92,342 68,097 60,678 Vineyards 28,535 51,620 60,380 56,982 25,438 46,413 40,177 17,739 60,292 106,459 96,294 83,020 Olive trees 14,226 19,785 8,432 17,900 11,697 22,815 28,838 30,526 36,353 31,134 29,726 42,384 Fruit trees 20,473 6,656 20,900 12,494 26,050 32,188 51,519 52,448 60,762 60,000 82,972 90,600 Tubers - - - - - 9,140 8,783 11,165 - - - -

IRRIGATED AREAS Cereals and pulses 25,449 25,801 22,790 28,184 5,796 14,267 12,214 14,676 76,482 65,559 79,944 85,833 Vineyards 3,868 34,715 33,500 3,230 2,005 913 2,182 - 4,491 7,300 5,000 - Olive tress 4,022 - 8,000 4,670 1,357 185 501 348 1,315 669 850 - Vegetables 904 554 2,351 1,933 1,140 1,000 998 1,275 2,494 3,500 4,168 11,370 Fruit trees 892 892 1,610 4,254 704 2,730 14,435 16,892 545 7,150 16,024 20,336 Industrial plants 2,500 1,000 2,594 3,900 2,800 800 558 987 1,000 600 259 50 Tubers, roots and bulbs 600 1,550 3,500 3,450 800 1,000 2,853 4,001 1,500 5,282 10,780 15,161 Fodder 600 1,500 2,705 5,650 700 1,011 1,314 2,322 3,500 11,500 14,392 14,455

SOURCE Ramón Garrabou, Un fals dilemma: modernitat o endarreriment de l’agricultura Valenciana (1850–1900) (València, 1985), 168–178 (Appendix 2). 252 | GALOFRÉ-VILÀ, MARTÍNEZ-CARRIÓN, AND PUCHE Technological Development in Agriculture In Tortella’sview, even though “Spain’s physical environment is ill suited to an improvement in agricultural techniques, technological change in agriculture was more developed in Valencia than in other areas due to irrigation.” According to Simpson, “Farmers in areas of traditional irrigation, such as Valencia, were adept at changing the crop mix and developing new seed varieties.” Garrabou agrees that “during the 18th century, the Valencian farmers stand out for [their] extraordinary ability to use a scarce resource such as water.” However, not all the municipalities in València used irrigation systems; the Mediterranean climate gave rise to low and irregular yields in rain-fed areas but high productivity in irrigated areas. Garrabou calculated that irrigated yields such as wheat and barley, which represented around 30 percent of the crops grown in València and more than 50 percent of those grown in Alacant and Castelló, at least doubled those of dry crops and were fre- quently three, four, and even five times as great. They also doubled or tripled the average yields of Spain as a whole. He and Simpson discovered that Valencian yields in agriculture were similar to those in northern European countries. Unsurprisingly, given the combination of warm temperatures and irrigation, the profits obtained from wheat or barley grown on irrigated land were much higher than those on rain-fed land—between three and four times in the case of wheat and six and seven times for barley. This regional differen- tiation allows us to compare the impact of climate on the heights of people born in high and low technological agricultural areas.7 All these specializations resulted in outstanding processes of technical change. Notwithstanding the introduction of mineral and chemical fertilizers, the most important technical innovation, despite a long-standing historical tradition, was the massive recourse to irrigation. At the end of the nineteenth century, water from irrigation reached 25 percent of the cultivated fields, a proportion greater than in any other region in Spain. Favorable temperatures and

7 Gabriel Tortella, “Patterns of Economic Retardation and Recovery in South-Western Europe in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries,” Economic History Review, XLVII (1994), 8; Garrabou, Un fals dilemma,31–32; Simpson, “La producción y la productividad agraria Españolas, 1890–1936,” Revista de Historia Economica—Journal of Iberian and Latin American Economic History, XII (1994), 43–84.

Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/jinh_a_01268 by guest on 24 September 2021 HEIGHT AND CLIMATE IN SPAIN | 253 insulation constituted the comparative advantage of València relative to other regions in Spain.8 Industrialization From the early nineteenth century, València followed a particular economic model—intensive, export-oriented agriculture driven by small businesses highly dependent on supporting development. Many industries supplied the necessary technology— such as machinery, packaging, and fertilizers—to rural areas. Others covered the demand of new and crowded urban centers for con- sumer goods. Hence, despite not being an industrial hub, by the 1910s, València was one of the most industrialized regions of Spain, surpassed only by Catalonia, Andalusia, and the Basque Country.9 Public Health and Sanitation As illustrated in Figure 1, dramatic improvements in health conditions fostered a transition from high birth and death rates to lower ones, interrupted only by the inﬂuenza pandemic of 1918 and the Spanish Civil War (1936–1939). In The Conquest of Health, Pérez Moreda et al. account for the Spanish demographic transition, delayed as it was in the European context, by improvements in sanitation and public hygiene. Indeed, the reduction in the number of deaths (particularly infant deaths) was due to a lower incidence of infectious diseases caused by water and airborne transmission, better personal hygiene (including washing hands and boiling drinking water), and municipal legislative reforms. Before these reforms occurred, some of the peaks in mortality during the nineteenth and early twentieth century were closely related to climatic conditions—for example, the major cholera outbreaks linked to heat waves in the summer and intense ﬂooding in the autumn.10

8 Calatayud, “Desarrollo agrario e Industrialización: Crecimiento y Crisis en la economía Valenciana del siglo XX,” Historia Contemporánea, XLII (2011), 105–147; Primitivo Artigas, Reseña geográfica y estadística de España (Madrid, 1888), 534–535. For chemical fertilizers, see Enric Mateu, “La elección de las técnicas de abonado en el cultivo del arroz en Valencia (1840–1930),” in Garrabou and José M. Naredo (eds.), La fertilización en los sistemas agrarios: Una perspectiva histórica (València, 1996), 255–271. 9 Tortella, “Patterns of Economic Retardation and Recovery,” 8; Simpson, Long Siesta, 277; Garrabou, Un fals dilemma, 82; Calatayud, “Desarrollo agrario e Industrialización,” 105–147. For the different levels of industrial intensity, see Parejo Barranco, “Andalucía en la industrialización de las regiones españolas (finales del siglo XVIII-finales del siglo XX),” in González de Molina Navarro and idem (eds.), La Historia de Andalucía a Debate. III. Industrialización y Desindustrialización de Andalucía (Barcelona, 2004). 10 Vicente Pérez Moreda, David Sven Reher, and Alberto Sanz Gimeno, La Conquista de la Salud: Mortalidad y Modernización en la España contemporánea (Madrid, 2015). Regarding public

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NOTES Since infants and children are generally the most vulnerable to infectious environments, they benefited most from improvements in public health. Both parts of the figure dis- play the effects of the cholera epidemic of 1865; the cholera epidemic of 1885 (which is believed to have killed 120,254 people, 33,609 of them from València); the Spanish Influenza (1918); the Spanish Civil War (1936–1939), and the postwar period. SOURCE Data are from Vicente Gozálvez Pérez, “Natalidad y mortalidad,” Cuadernos de Geografía, LXXIII/IV (2003), 277–302.

After the Spanish Civil War, morbidity and mortality resumed its downward trend, with a notable improvement in mortality attributable in large part to the introduction of the antibiotics and the sulfa drugs in the mid-1930s, followed by penicillin in the mid-1940s. Vaccination virtually eliminated the previously common infectious diseases diphtheria, tetanus, and measles. Hence, sanitation and public-health reforms eventually overcame the climatic penalty of the old regime.11 Diseases In A’Hearn’s words, “Beyond the general level and trend of economic development, there are speciﬁc features of the Mediterranean world that ought to have affected height, such as

efforts in municipal reforms, in Alcoi, the per capita budget for sanitation over total spending increased from 0.39 pesetas (1836–1840) to 2.08 (1846–1850), 2.75 (1891–1895), 6.97 (1906– 1910), and 11.33 (1911–1914). Data are from José Joaquín García Gómez, “Living Standards of Workers in Alcoy: Wages, Nutrition and Health Reform (1836–1913),” Economic History Research, XI (2015), 164–173. 11 For further details, see Vicente Gozálvez Pérez, “Natalidad y mortalidad,” Cuadernos de Geografía, LXXIII/IV (2003), 277–302.

Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/jinh_a_01268 by guest on 24 September 2021 HEIGHT AND CLIMATE IN SPAIN | 255 climate-related protein scarcity and other dietary deﬁciencies . . . and conditions conducive to endemic diseases such as malaria.” Malaria, which is highly sensitive to the climatic environment, was endemic to in some areas of nineteenth-century València. Although irrigated areas helped crops to grow, they also created conditions conducive to malaria. Malaria is a greater threat of morbidity than mortality; the physical weakness caused by malarial fever facilitates the development of complications from other diseases. Until the mid-twentieth century, malaria and digestive diseases like dysentery, enteritis, and diarrhoea were particularly prevalent, caused by the combination of poor diet, hot weather, and scarcity of fresh food. Digestive diseases, which accounted for more than half of children’sdeaths, skyrocketed during the summer months. As already seen, potable water and sewerage were not common until well into the twentieth century.12 Urbanization Despite Spain being a poor country, where industrialization did not begin until the second half of the twentieth century, València’s urban centers were important for their role in the development of the region’s industrial processes. The percentage of the urban population living in towns (those with more than 5,000 inhabitants) was greater in València than in Spain as a whole—in 1860, 32 percent (Spain 22.6 percent), in 1900, 37.2 percent (Spain 29.3 percent), in 1930, 46.4 percent (Spain, 37.1percent), and in 1960, 60.2 percent (Spain, 50.7 percent). Out of all seventeen Spanish regions, València was only behind the regions of Madrid (with 60.6 percent in 1860 and 88.0 percent in 1960) and Catalonia (27.8 percent in 1860 and 69.2 percent in 1960). The rapid accel- eration of València’s initial urbanization and industrialization carried an urban penalty, lowering the well-being of the working classes living in such cities as Alcoi and Elx. In the twentieth century, however, the situation reversed: When urban centers began to confront mortality with public-health movements, sanitary

12 Brian A’Hearn, “The Anthropometric History of the Mediterranean World,” in Komlos and Kelly (eds.), The Oxford Handbook of Economics and Human Biology (New York, 2016), 3. For malaria in València, see Bueno Marí and Jiménez Peydró, “Crónicas de Arroz, Mosquitos y Paludismo en España: El caso de la provincia de Valencia (s. XVIII–XX),” Revista Española de Historia, LXX (2010), 687–708; Martínez-Carrión, “Stature, Welfare and Economic Growth in Nineteenth Century Spain: The Case of Murcia,” in Komlos (ed.) Stature, Living Standards and Economic Development: Essays in Anthropometric History (Chicago, 1994), 76–89; for digestive diseases, Garrabou, Un fals dilema; Pérez Moreda, Reher, and Sanz Gimeno, La Conquista de la Salud.

Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/jinh_a_01268 by guest on 24 September 2021 256 | GALOFRÉ-VILÀ, MARTÍNEZ-CARRIÓN, AND PUCHE reforms, and new investments in infrastructure during the 1920s and 1930s, rural life was no longer a safer bet with respect to longevity.13 External Events Notable among the external events was the Spanish Civil War (1936–1939), which led to an inadequate food supply and an uncompetitive and autarchic economy. Beyond the negative effects of the War, the postwar period (autarky under Francisco Franco) had even worse food shortages and the resort to ration cards. The richer and more industrial regions—such as Catalonia, the Basque country, and València—remained faithful to the Republic. However, Franco’s uprising took control of most of the agricultural areas, where only around 30 percent of the total agrarian product was in the hands of the Republicans. Life worsened for most people during the Civil War, though not as much in València as in other Republican zones (Catalonia for one) because of the region’s extensive land ownership, its greater agricultural production (particularly in irrigated areas), and its agricultural cooperatives. Although the effects of the war were independent of any climatic event, people were arguably more exposed to the rigors of environmental conditions in times of war. For instance, Sanz Gimeno and Ramiro Fariñas found that in Spain during and after the Civil War, deaths from infectious diseases and water- and food-borne diseases rapidly increased. More- over, the evidence shows that during the postwar period, the combined effects of deprivation by autarchy in rural areas and a persistent drought in the mid-1940s caused food shortages and delays in adolescent growth spurt.14

13 Urbanization data are from Tafunell, “Urbanización y vivienda,” in Albert Carreras and Xavier Tafunell (eds.), Estadísticas históricas de España siglos XIX–XX (Madrid, 2005), 484–486 (Table 6.3). For the urban penalty in València, see Martínez Carrión et al., “La brecha rural-urbana de la estatura y el nivel de vida al comienzo de la industrialización española,” Historia Social, LXXX (2014), 35–57; Martínez Carrión and Juan José Pérez Castejón, “Height and Standards of Living during the Industrialisation of Spain: The Case of Elche,” European Review of Economic History, II (1998), 201–230. 14 Martínez-Carrión, Puche, and Josep-Maria Ramon-Muñoz, “Nutrición y desigualdad social en la España de Franco: Evidencia antropométrica,” in Antoni Segura, Andreu Mayayo, and Teresa Abelló (eds.), La dictadura franquista: La institucionalizació d’un règim (Barcelona, 2012), 271–284; Puche, “Guerra Civil, autarquía franquista y bienestar biológico en el mundo rural valenciano,” Historia Agraria, LII (2010), 129–162; José Cañabate-Cabezuelos and Martínez-Carrion “Poverty and Rural Height in Inland Spain during the Nutrition Transition,” Historia Agraria, LXX (2017), 109–142.

Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/jinh_a_01268 by guest on 24 September 2021 HEIGHT AND CLIMATE IN SPAIN | 257 Moreover, World War I (in which Spain was a neutral country) expanded industry in Catalonia but also curtailed Valencian agricultural exports, at least until the early 1920s when Europe re- covered. Yet, the loss of several important markets, such as the German, the Austro-Hungarian, and the Belgian, and a reduction in commercial trafﬁc with France, were a great handicap for the commercialization of Valencian citrus and fruits.15 Climate The climate of Spain—humid in the north and dry around the Mediterranean—deﬁnes the diversity of the regions. The region of València has the Mediterranean climate—warm, drysummers;wet,mildwinters;andrainduringtheautumn months. The average yearly temperature is 14.72°C and rainfall 414.61mm, the result of a number of geographical and climatic factors. The weather largely depends on distance above sea level. Areas become colder and wetter with elevation, whereas those at sea level to 900 meters above, such as ports, are warmer and drier. Those municipalities lying in the highlands have greater exposure to sunlight, receiving an abundant source of vitamin D, and their crops mature earlier than those in other level areas.16 Latitude also matters; the southern areas in the province of Alacant tend to be warmer and drier. Furthermore, as distance from the sea increases, temperatures drop, and rainfall increases. The sea acts like a thermostat, regulating and softening temperatures. Inland areas have colder, longer winters and mild summers. Given the relative higher humidity in coastal location, the thermal conditions there in the summer months are warmer than elsewhere in the region. Climatic conditions also change by season. In January, the temperature ranges from 10 to 11°C in coastal areas and 3 to 4°C in the highlands. In June, temperatures differ by 3°C in the coastal and mountain areas. Environmental factors such as the rough- ness of the terrain and the wind direction help to determine rainfall

15 Alberto Sanz Gimeno and Diego Ramiro Fariñas, “La caída de la mortalidad en la in- fancia en la España interior, 1860–1960: Un análisis de las causas de muerte,” Cuadernos de Historia Contemporánea, XXIV (2002), 151–188. For the effects of the Civil War on height, see Martínez-Carrión and Pérez Castejón, “Height and Standards of Living,” 201–230. 16 For the details of environmental and climatic conditions in València, see Piqueras, Espacio Valenciano: Una síntesis geográﬁca (València, 1999). A comarca is the Valencian administrative sub- division, which is between the level of a municipality and a province. Our description of the climatic data derives from Carlo Casty et al., “A European Pattern Climatology 1766–2000,” Climate Dynamics, XXIX (2007), 791–805, available at http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/paleo/ pubs/casty2007/casty2007.html. See next section.

Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/jinh_a_01268 by guest on 24 September 2021 258 | GALOFRÉ-VILÀ, MARTÍNEZ-CARRIÓN, AND PUCHE patterns. València shares the Mediterranean climate, but the region shows wide variability in its weather and environment.17 The average rainfall is mostly between 400 and 500 mm per year, although it can range from 250 mm in Elx and Oriola to 600–800 mm per year in the highlands of Gandia and Pego. The rainfall is most copious in September and October; September is a crucial month for agricultural production, when important crops such as rice are harvested. Rainy autumns are important for water- ing crops and sustaining life. Aside from the climatic conditions of a given year, the seasonal distribution of temperatures and rainfall have the utmost importance for agricultural production, as well as the spreading of diseases such as malaria, diarrhea, and enteritis. The hot and dry summer months severely limit crop growth except in areas with good irrigation.

THE UNIQUENESS OF VALÈNCIA What was the role of climate in this unique context of development? The Valencian economy began to evolve during the middle of the nineteenth century in a way that differed from that of the rest of Spain. On the one hand, an increasingly widespread access to land generated an intensive export agriculture and an agricultural surplus that permitted the improvement of living standards for València’s dense population. This model of agrarian development contrasted with that of rural Spain elsewhere, which generally remained within the parameters of a typical dryland agriculture in which traditional crops pre- dominated, especially cereals. On the other hand, València’s industrial development, driven by its dynamic agricultural sector, was better than the national mean (though not on a par with that of Catalonia or the Basque Country). Irrigation and climate combined to enable Valencian agriculture to cultivate abundant fruit and horticulture for export, as well as to satisfy a growing urban demand for fresh fruits and vegetables. As Calatayud argues, “The Valencian Community was thus part of the continental ‘periphery’ able to take advantage of the comparative advantages—of a climatic, economic and social type—to

17 This regime is based on extreme temperatures with cold winters and hot summers. Although the thermal amplitude is moderate, the extreme thermal amplitude is high. The average thermal amplitude is the difference between the average maximum and the average minimum temperatures of a year. The extreme thermal amplitude measures the difference between the hottest and the coldest day of a year.

Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/jinh_a_01268 by guest on 24 September 2021 HEIGHT AND CLIMATE IN SPAIN | 259 supply primary products. This stimulus materialized when the change in dietary diets in Europe, linked to new concepts of health and nutrition and the rise in living standards, increased consumption of fruits and vegetables.” He further remarks that irrigation and crop specialization were due to “favourable conditions of temperatures and sunshine that constituted the regional comparative advantage.”18 To what extent did València’s unique situation also contribute to well-being? What is the causal role between climate and stature? As already known, climate, at least until recent decades, interacted with a range of factors—diet, disease, and activity—potentially to influence stature. Climate can affect stature through its direct effect on the availability of food, agricultural production, the disease environment (by, say, creating malaria-endemic areas and cholera outbreaks), and on workload (in irrigated or unirrigated areas). Finally, climate can influence stature through temperature, rainfall, and exposure to sunlight and the synthesis of vitamin D. The literature contains numerous references to the dynamism of the Valencian economy but also to its weakness given its unique climatic conditions. As Vicente Gozálvez Pérez illustrates it, “Due to rainfall and strong storms, in September 1884 there were floods in the Segura, Turia and Júcar rivers, causing immense agricultural losses in the Valencian orchards. The snowfall of 14–15 January 1885, with snow for over 8 days and temperatures of −7°C, completely ruined the orange harvest. Exports to France, Italy, England and Germany were paralyzed by these governments because of cholera, and as a consequence, there was a sharp depreci- ation of export agriculture: rice, oranges, raisins, peanuts, hemp and beans, and, in 1887 also of wine. In the last year, the crisis in agricultural prices was disrupted by frost in February and an epidemic greatly affected infants and children from croup, measles and smallpox, which remarkably increased mortality throughout, especially in Castellón which rose to 34.7 percent.”19 Thirty years earlier, Nadal also observed that “the year 1855 for the Valencian economy was one of the most fateful in its history. Frost in January, exceptional rainfall throughout the winter and floods in spring. The result: bad harvests, with large losses in the production of oranges and horticultural crops. Moreover, the

18 Calatayud, “Desarrollo agrario e Industrialización,” 105–147. 19 Gozálvez Pérez, “Natalidad y mortalidad,” 287–288.

Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/jinh_a_01268 by guest on 24 September 2021 260 | GALOFRÉ-VILÀ, MARTÍNEZ-CARRIÓN, AND PUCHE decadent silk industry suffered collapse with the absolute loss of silkworm . . . because of the cold. Then the crisis of production impactedtrade...andtheproletariatgotalmostnowages;the immediate consequence was hunger, poverty and pauperism.”20

SOURCES, DATA, AND METHODOLOGY Climatic Data This article employs gridded climatic data from Casty et al.—the only ones that report temperature and precipitation at the European level for years prior to 1900. These data are available on a monthly basis between 1766 and 2000 at a grid resolution of 0.5° by 0.5°, in which one grid cell represents a distance of around 55 km. The Casty data set is exceptional for a climate field reconstruction that relies on instrumental readings (avoiding multiproxy approaches and paleoclimate evidence), each climatic variable independently estimated. Gridded fields are generated by regressing a spatial network of station data against modern gridded climate data, with the consideration of certain controls, such as stationary behavior and long instrumental station data. Figure 2 reports the mean and variation (by looking at the coefficient of variation) of temperature and precipitation for the eight available grid cells that lie within the Valencian region, showing a significant amount of climatic variation across the different areas. Additionally, the statistics of the variables temperature and precipitation for the Dickey Fuller test were −4.517 and −11.818, respectively, below any of the critical values at 1 percent (−3.504) and rejecting the null hypothesis for the climatic variables.21 Heights in the Region of València The male heights for Mediterranean Spain come from military records preserved in the Sección de Quintas of eleven municipalities in the region of València—five in the province of Alacant (Alcoi, Elx, Oriola, Pego, and Villena), two in the province of Castelló (Castelló de la Plana and Villareal), and four in the province of València (Alcira, Gandia, Requena, and Sueca). The collection of data for this study comprises men born between 1850 and 1949, a total of 120,582. Beginning in the mid-nineteenth century, all Spanish men had to fulfiltheir military obligations, the first step being a medical examination that

20 Jordi Nadal, La población española (siglos XVI a XX) (Ann Arbor, 1973), 160. 21 Carreras, “Clima,” in idem and Tafunell (eds.), Estadísticas Históricas de España,33–76; Dell, Jones, and Olken, “What Do We Learn?” 749. Climatic data from Casty et al., “European Pattern.”

Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/jinh_a_01268 by guest on 24 September 2021 HEIGHT AND CLIMATE IN SPAIN | 261 Fig.2 Mean and Coefﬁcient of Variation in Temperature and Rainfall in the Grid Cells of Alacant, Castelló, and València, 1800–1999

NOTES One degree at the equator is about 111 km, and a half-degree at the equator is about 55 km. Above and below the equator, the circles deﬁning the parallels of latitude get smaller until they become a single point at the poles where the meridians converge. Yet, it is accurate to say that in Spain, grids are separated by 55 km; in the tropics, this distance is 55.28 km (instead of 55). SOURCE Carlo Casty et al., “A European Pattern Climatology 1766–2000,”Climate Dynamics,XXIX (2007), 791–805, available at http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/paleo/pubs/casty2007/casty2007.html.

recorded such anthropometric measurements as height, weight, and chest circumference (although we have mostly transcribed height data). The military replacement records were accompanied by a vast array of documentation, including birth certiﬁcates, transfers into other municipalities, migration records, etc. The Recruitment Acts (the legislation that established the age of conscription) mandated the measurement of men’s heights at the ages of twenty between 1856 and 1885 for the ﬁrst draft, of nineteen between 1885 (second draft) and 1899, and of twenty between 1901 and 1905. Given that the conscripts of a given cohort were called at different ages to undergo the medical examination, we re- moved problems of age heaping. However, whereas a boy in a well-nourished population might reach a mature height at the age of eighteen or nineteen and a girl at the age of sixteen or seventeen,

Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/jinh_a_01268 by guest on 24 September 2021 262 | GALOFRÉ-VILÀ, MARTÍNEZ-CARRIÓN, AND PUCHE nutritional problems during growth can delay mature height until twenty to twenty-five years. Since the ages between nineteen and twenty-one leave room for growth, we standardized the heights for the different ages by calculating and comparing average heights at the fiftieth percentile of the three generations of youths measured at different ages but close in time (between 1895 and 1911).22 Not surprisingly, our first group (those conscripted between 1895 and 1899, measured at nineteen years of age) was the shortest; our second one (those conscripted between 1901 and 1905, measured at twenty years of age), was taller; and our third one (those conscripted between 1907 and 1911, measured at twenty-one years of age) was the tallest. Hence, compared to those measured at the age of twenty-one, the nineteen-year-olds had a further 1.2 cm to grow and the 20-year- olds 0.4 cm; we added the respective height differentials to the nineteen- and twenty-year-old recruits. We cannot use dummies to control for the rate of growth at different ages because we do not have different ages for the same cohorts, just for juxtaposed periods. Since the data correspond to conscripted soldiers, and all men, regardless of height, had to undergo a medical examination, this conscript sample is representative of the Valencian population without any selection issues. In the data set, 92.6 percent of the conscripts were born in the region of València, 58.8 percent com- ing from the provinces of Alacant, 17.9 percent from Castelló, and 23.3 percent from València. We can discount the possibility of any effects of migration in the selection from the sample (for example, taller people migrating to warmer areas to seek better employment); the sample shows negligible migration patterns. According to Ayuda and Puche, about 80 percent of the conscripts were born in the municipalities where they enlisted; around 10 percent had migrated to towns within the Valencian region; 5 percent had migrated to the Spanish south while young (usually Murcia and Andalusia); and the remaining 5 percent were born in another country.23

22 For the attainment of mature height, see James M. Tanner, Growth at Adolescence: With a General Consideration of the Effects of Hereditary and Environmental Factors upon Growth and Mat- uration from Birth to Maturity (Oxford, 1962). If ages were otherwise self-reported at measurement, the measurement error tends to decline over time as people gain human capital and place more emphasis on knowing their birthday. 23 For the height adjustment with regard to age and migration, see Ayuda and Puche, “Determinants of Height and Biological Inequality in Mediterranean Spain, 1859–1967,” Economics and Human Biology, XV (2014), 101–119.

Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/jinh_a_01268 by guest on 24 September 2021 HEIGHT AND CLIMATE IN SPAIN | 263 In addition to anthropometric data, military registers collected detailed information about 2,638 occupations, which we grouped into twelve categories using HISCLASS. Height clearly varies with social class. The tallest recruits were from upper management (above 168 cm), followed by high-level professionals, lower managers, and clerical and sales personnel (at between 196 and 167 cm), and medium- and low-skilled workers and laborers (165 cm). Farmers and fishermen were nearly the same size as unskilled farm workers at 164 cm, and the lower-skilled farm workers were the shortest recruits, at 163 cm. Although unreported herein, this range of heights closely matches a normal distribution of the heights of the total population over time. Indeed, the standard de- viation of the heights across different cohorts also remains fairly constant over time. The small degree of height heaping in the sample has only a marginal effect on the estimated final height.24 Linking Individuals to their Birthplace We use the details about the town/city of birth to link individuals to their climatic correlates in space and time by assigning latitudes and longitudes to each soldier in accordance with his place of birth. We link climatic data to the place and the year in which an individual was born—the time at which growth is most sensitive to environmental and nutritional shock—in accordance with the growing consensus that children recover from slow growth in their first thousand days only with great difficulty. Moreover, focusing on the first year of life allows us to identify members of the same cohort, while acknowledging that final or mature height reflects the cumulative impact of environmental and nutritional conditions throughout the period of growth.25 After geocoding all of the individuals by birthplace (Figure 3), we linked their height data with their high-resolution climatic

24 For inequality in heights, see Ayuda and Puche “Determinants”; for age and height heaping, Floud et al., Changing Body. 25 For recovery from slow growth in the ﬁrst thousand days of life, see Cesar Gomes Victora et al., “Worldwide Timing of Growth Faltering: Revisiting Implications for Inter- ventions,” Pediatrics, CXXV (2010), e473–e480. We made corrections to the original names only when they were misspelled—for example, La Torre d’en Besora (Castelló) for Torre de Embesora,orGavarda (València) for Gabarda. Notably, the Spanish laws included the conven- tion of changing former names in Valencian into their Castilian form. For example, Xàtiva was recorded as Jativa, Poble de Vallbona as Puebla de Balbuena, and Vilamarxant as Villamarchante.We translated names into original Valencian forms in order to locate them successfully.

Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/jinh_a_01268 by guest on 24 September 2021 264 | GALOFRÉ-VILÀ, MARTÍNEZ-CARRIÓN, AND PUCHE Fig.3 Number of Recruits Born between 1850 and 1949 by Birthplace in the Region of València

NOTES The left-hand figure shows the number of men born in each of the comarques of the Valencian region. The right-hand figure shows the exact place of birth together with the size of the grid cell (at 0.5° by 0.5° resolution). A dot representing the place of birth in the right figure can represent a group of individuals when reported under the same name.

correlates using GIS (geographical information system) software (ArcGIS), performing a spatial join based on location using the Euclidean distance between the birthplace and the climatic grid point. GIS analysis helps to match the individuals in the height sample (by their birthplace) with high-resolution-indexed climatic data by place and year of birth. As a result, temperature and precipitation are linked to each conscript: For man i, born in place k in year t, we attached the gridded temperature and precipitation in year t that is closest to place k with the aid of GIS software. Temperature and precipitation change by birthplace, according to latitude and longitude, and time, according to year of birth.

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION Seasonal Weather and Stature in València The next question is whether a particular season (each of the four quarters of the year) exerts a meaningful effect on stature. Examining the association between climatic conditions and the month in which growth is fastest, Tanner concluded, “The season of the year . . . exerts a

Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/jinh_a_01268 by guest on 24 September 2021 HEIGHT AND CLIMATE IN SPAIN | 265 considerable inﬂuence on velocity of growth, at least in west European children. . . . Children grow faster in height in spring and summer than in autumn and winter.” He found that the average May to November growth rate was 0.2 cm per year faster than the rate between November and May, but he also maintained that “the cause of the seasonal effect is not known. Presumably the en- docrine system is affected by light or temperature or some other climatic or just possibly some nutritional factor.”26 Table 2 explores the impact of weather (as measured by the different climatic seasons) on heights with the equation: ¼ α þ β þ β þ β Heightit 1Temperatureit;s 2 Rainfallit;s 3 Elevationi þ β þ β þ β 4 Populationi;1900 5 Illiteracyi 6 Birth Decadei;p þ β þ β þ ε ð Þ 7 Occupationi;l 8 Placeof Measurementi;m t 1 The dependent variable is stature for the individual i born in year t. Temperature and Rainfall indicate the seasonal temperature and rainfall in each year t (s=winter, . . . , autumn); elevation varies with each comarca of birth above sea level (in meters); population size pertains to each comarca of birth in 1900; illiteracy refers to a matrix of dummy variables for the recruits; birth decade runs from 1850 to 1940 ( p=1850, . . . .,1940); occupation corresponds to individuals’ reports (l=1, . . . ,12); place of measurement is the municipality where arecruitwasmeasured(m=Alcoi,Alcira, ...,Villena);and εt is the error term. Model 1 shows the full sample, model 2 only nonirrigated areas, and model 3 irrigated areas. For all the models in Section 4, robust standard errors are clustered at the grid level because the data set contains many individuals who share the same temperature and precipitation grid cell.27 The empirical design has at least four potential limitations worth noting. First, given that recruiters recorded month of birth only for those conscripted after the 1950s, all of the subjects have been rounded to their birth year. This generalized adjustment can be problematical because the eleven months’ difference between an individual born in, say, January and December of the same year would leave room for further growth. Thus, when looking at the

26 Tanner, Growth,15;idem, “The Regulation of Human Growth,” Child Development, XXXIV (1963), 821. 27 Population data for each comarca are from the census of 1900.

Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/jinh_a_01268 by guest on 24 September 2021 266 | GALOFRÉ-VILÀ, MARTÍNEZ-CARRIÓN, AND PUCHE Fig.4 Number of Births over the Monthly Mean (Mean=100)

NOTES The chart on the left shows data from 1863 to 1970 for the three provinces of the region of València; the chart on the right shows the data for the region of València in three different periods. SOURCE Movimiento de Población de España, several issues.

impact of a climatic variable, this measurement gap could lead to large standard errors with lower significance levels.28 We can explore the seriousness of this bias by looking at the number of births by month in the region of València. Figure 4, which displays the proportion of births over the mean period, shows that the number of births was not uniform by month, changing throughout the twentieth century. Variability was more pronounced before more recent decades. Sánchez-Albornoz found that before 1900, the number of births tended to concentrate in the months of January and May. Lent and the agricultural calendar marked the patterns of gestation and birth—a rational strategy, considering that during spring and autumn (during pregnancy), food is abundant and disease exposure low. Figure 4 also indicates that during the early twentieth century, humans were less reliant on agriculture and seasonal fluctuations. The emergence of the industrial sector and economic development in the 1930s and 1940s marked the decline of these fluctuations, equalizing the number of births across months.29 Another important limitation in the model is that these results beg the question of whether the climatic conditions in the first year of life were contemporaneous—that is, whether the effects

28 It is possible to ascertain the month of birth by linking it with auxiliary secondary sources, such as census or baptismal records. But this strategy would require substantial work given our sample size. 29 Nicolas Sánchez-Albornoz, Jalones en la modernización de España (Barcelona, 1975).

Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/jinh_a_01268 by guest on 24 September 2021 HEIGHT AND CLIMATE IN SPAIN | 267 of climatic conditions at t−1 are reflected in t (or t in t+1, etc.). This question can be explained in terms of adaptive responses related to growth: Did a child’s postnatal environment match the prenatal conditions as reflected in the nutritional status of the mother? A poor or a good rainfall season can affect a mother’s net nutrition during the prenatal period and thus her child’s growth trajectory; the availability of nutrients in the womb has a bearing on health in later life. It is, indeed, at t−1 during the third trimester that a foetus adds bulk. Our use of yearly data, however, prevents us from controlling for shorter events. The third caveat involves the way in which the irrigation variable is organized; sampling men within a century means that irrigation systems could have undergone significant changes within that timeframe for which we cannot fully control. For instance, two municipalities classified as nonirrigated—Castelló de la Plana and Elx—experienced rapid improvements in irrigation during the 1920s that do not figure into our models. Finally, climatic inter- actions are not represented per se in the equation since time trends are already included in the climatic variables and birth decades.30 Table 2 shows that temperature is positive and statistically significant during the summer and winter months, but especially during autumn. Hence, men born in years with warmer summers, autumns, and winters tended to be taller. In nonirrigated areas, however, temperatures are not statistically significant, whereas in irrigated areas, only warmer winters and autumns are statistically significant. The precipitation variable shows that spring and summer rains were important for food production and that precipitation was much more influential in nonirrigated areas. Since rice—a staple food intensely developed since the mid-nineteenth century—and the majority of other crops are harvested in the spring, the positive and statistically significant association between stature and spring and summer months in nonirrigated areas is hardly surprising. Although few studies have investigated rainfall’seffecton wheat yields, the Mancomunidad Hidrográfica del Ebro (1931), a

30 For adaptive responses in relation to growth, see Peter Gluckman and Mark Hanson, “The Consequences of Being Born Small—An Adaptive Perspective,” Hormone Research, LXV (2006), 5–14. We do not need to explore contemporaneous effects further. Future inves- tigations would do well to take time lags into account since temperature and rainfall experienced during t−1 may affect growth during t.

Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/jinh_a_01268 by guest on 24 September 2021 Table 2 Stature and Seasonal Weather Variation in the Region of València for the Cohorts Born between 1850 and 1949

TOTAL NONIRRIGATED IRRIGATED SAMPLE AREAS AREAS (1) (2) (3) Winter temperatures 0.067* 0.040 0.066* (0.024) (0.043) (0.024) Spring temperatures −0.056 0.034 −0.095 (0.060) (0.055) (0.071) Summer temperatures 0.053* 0.064 0.048 (0.022) (0.120) (0.029) Autumn temperatures 0.117*** 0.084 0.124** (0.029) (0.106) (0.037) Winter rainfall −0.002 0.001 −0.003 (0.001) (0.004) (0.002) Spring rainfall 0.001 0.007** −0.002 (0.003) (0.002) (0.004) Summer rainfall 0.005** 0.005*** 0.005* (0.001) (0.001) (0.002) Autumn rainfall 0.002 −0.002 0.003 (0.002) (0.005) (0.002) Elevation 0.000 −0.000 0.001 (0.000) (0.000) (0.001) Population 0.000 0.000 0.000 (0.000) (0.000) (0.000) Illiteracy −1.015*** −0.983*** −1.046*** (0.159) (0.038) (0.207)

BIRTH DECADE (REF. 1850) 1860 0.349* −4.934*** 0.435*** (0.125) (0.803) (0.073) 1870 0.143 −4.335*** 0.171 (0.488) (0.794) (0.620) 1880 1.563*** −4.620*** 0.718*** (0.252) (0.745) (0.229) 1890 1.607*** −4.813*** 1.807*** (0.239) (0.837) (0.162) 1900 1.715*** −4.215*** 1.847*** (0.278) (0.754) (0.253) 1910 2.318*** −3.581*** 2.451*** (0.335) (0.730) (0.360) 1920 2.230*** −3.691*** 2.380*** (0.230) (0.730) (0.344) 1930 3.281*** −2.146** 3.236*** (0.393) (0.700) (0.523) 1940 4.041*** −1.68 4.123*** (0.311) (0.792) (0.491)

Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/jinh_a_01268 by guest on 24 September 2021 Table 2 (Continued )

TOTAL NONIRRIGATED IRRIGATED SAMPLE AREAS AREAS (1) (2) (3)

OCCUPATION (REF. HISCLASS 2: HIGHER PROFESSIONALS) Higher managers 1.070*** −1.357* −0.982* (0.228) (0.541) (0.326) Lower managers 0.259 0.393 0.236 (0.184) (0.652) (0.246) Lower professionals, clerical, etc. 0.469 0.456 0.477 (0.224) (0.550) (0.267) Lower clerical and salesmen −0.455 −0.721 −0.386 (0.290) (1.004) (0.311) Medium-skilled workers 1.706*** 1.389* 1.822** (0.207) (0.623) (0.267) Farmers and ﬁshermen −2.108*** −2.547*** −1.96*** (0.262) (0.596) (0.312) Lower-skilled workers −0.816*** −1.031 −0.733** (0.185) (0.551) (0.216) Lower-skilled farm workers −0.952*** −1.201 −0.841* (0.213) (0.639) (0.269) Unskilled workers −0.613* −1.001 −0.506 (0.281) (0.573) (0.399) Unskilled farm workers −1.348*** −1.205 −1.389*** (0.185) (0.604) (0.140)

PLACE OF MEASUREMENT (REF. CASTELLÓ DE LA PLANA) Alcoi 0.049 −0.142 0.185 (0.209) (0.505) (0.262) Alcira 0.276 −0.501 0.352 (0.196) (0.543) (0.268) Elx −0.286 −0.358 −0.531 (0.198) (0.598) (0.309) Gandia 1.207*** 0.930 1.221*** (0.099) (0.461) (0.140) Oriola 0.407*** 0.171 0.427** (0.049) (0.557) (0.101) Pego 2.073*** 1.466* 3.447** (0.256) (0.531) (1.042) Requena 0.072 0.167 0.375 (0.186) (0.314) (0.504) Sueca 0.652*** −1.035* 0.744** (0.131) (0.461) (0.181) Villarreal 1.018*** 0.678 1.031*** (0.099) (0.386) (0.120) Villena 0.486** 0.511 0.790 (0.164) (0.363) (0.190)

Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/jinh_a_01268 by guest on 24 September 2021 270 | GALOFRÉ-VILÀ, MARTÍNEZ-CARRIÓN, AND PUCHE Table 2 (Continued )

TOTAL NONIRRIGATED IRRIGATED SAMPLE AREAS AREAS (1) (2) (3) Constant 161.863*** 166.803*** 162.447*** (0.832) (2.023) (0.921) Number of individuals 107,723 24,463 81,260 R-squared 0.078 0.084 0.077 *p< 0.05. **p< 0.01. ***p< 0.001. NOTE Robust standard errors are clustered at the grid level.

Spanish Governmental Agency, reported a positive and significant relationship between rainfall in spring and wheat harvests in dry areas of the Saragossa and Osca provinces near València between 1914 and 1927. Clearly, in irrigated areas, rain is less important, only needed during the summer months to avoid drought, which ruins harvests and reduces the nutrients available in the soil for the crop seasons to come. Otherwise, irrigated water could compen- sate for a lack of rain.31 Staple crops were collected and sold in the markets during the autumn months, providing not only nutrients but also new sources of income and savings in the form of cash crops that were much in urban demand; warm temperatures before collection were crucial for the fruits to mature. The grape harvest or vintage ran from September through mid-October. As already noted, the expansion of viticulture was the most important development in Valencian agriculture during the second half of the nineteenth century. Moreover, sunlight during the summer months provided 90 to 95 percent of the population’s vitamin D. Warmer temperatures during the winter months were also positive and statistically significant. Where temperatures were not extremely cold, as in the irrigated areas close to the coast, workers in the fields or factories were less physically taxed, because, as Bogin explained, they needed to expend lower amounts of energy to maintain optimal temperature.

31 For the study of the Mancomunidad Hidrográﬁca, see José Domingo, “Correlación entre la Lluvia y Cosecha de trigo en el secano de las Provincias de Zaragoza y Huesca,” Revista mensual de la Mancomunidad Hidrográﬁca del Ebro, XLIX (1931), 1–4.

Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/jinh_a_01268 by guest on 24 September 2021 HEIGHT AND CLIMATE IN SPAIN | 271 The body’s thermoregulatory process includes heat retention in cold environments to avoid hypothermia and heat dissipation in hot environments to avoid heat prostration.32 Although elevation and population size are not statistically significant, education is; illiterate recruits (defined as not being able to read and write) were shorter by 1 cm. The association of height with literacy is related to the connection between literacy and greater human capital and better employment. Given those in highly skilled occupations as a reference group in Table 2 (HISCLASS 2: higher professionals), men with a highly skilled occupation are taller than those who are unskilled or from the working class. Indeed, farmers and fisherman were shorter than professionals by nearly 2 cm. This income/wealth effect situates lower-skilled farm workers as the shortest recruits, followed by medium-skilled workers (probably because they worked in urban centers), and unskilled and lower-skilled workers. The geographical controls show that height changed not only according to climatic, educational, and professional levels but also according to technological conditions. Location was important for the cultivation of highly valued crops, due to a combination of climatic and environmental conditions; irrigation gave rise to a need for chemical, biological, and mechanical resources and changes in production methods (selected seeds, tube-wells, fertilizers, etc.). Irrigation also had multiplier benefits. If oranges were grown at the expense of other more profitable crops, the profits would have been lower. But the penetration of oranges in the Valencian orchards was due to the substitution of rice and other less profitable crops. Using Castelló de la Plana, a nonirrigated area, as a reference, recruits measured in irrigated areas were substantially taller than those in nonirrigated areas (such as Requena and Villena) and urban areas (for example,

32 For the expansion of viticulture, see Garrabou, Un fals dilemma; for vitamin D, Michael Holick, “Sunlight and Vitamin D for Bone Health and Prevention of Autoimmune Diseases, Cancers, and Cardiovascular Disease,” American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, LXXX (2004), 1678S; Pérez Moreda, Reher, and Sanz Gimeno, La conquista. Barry Bogin, Patterns of Human Growth (New York, 1999). Warm weather and unhealthy sanitary conditions might have helped the spread of malaria to infants as well as older children. Since child labor was widespread among boys ten and older, wetlands and irrigated areas could have negatively affected the same individual at birth, during adolescence, and during adulthood. Although we would like to track the inﬂuence of sunlight on children’s heights, good sunlight data are in short supply for pre-1970 Spain.

Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/jinh_a_01268 by guest on 24 September 2021 272 | GALOFRÉ-VILÀ, MARTÍNEZ-CARRIÓN, AND PUCHE Elx and Alcoi). Those from orchard areas of Gandia, Pego, and Villarreal were taller by about 1–2cm. Interestingly, although Oriola and Sueca were irrigated areas, they were also malaria-endemic areas in the mid-nineteenth century (the orchards of Oriola and the rice fields of Sueca). Apparently, certain irrigated areas also imposed an environmental penalty for health. Hence, although they show taller heights than the reference group, the coefficient is below that of other irrigated areas (Gandia, Pego, and Villareal). In considering regional effects, note that the most successful municipalities were not clustered in a single province but were spread across the three provinces, eliminating concerns of sample selection. Height and Climate in Mediterranean Spain The effects of temperature and rainfall on the height of the recruits is evaluated with the equation ¼ α þ β þ β þ Ω þ ε : Heightit 1 Temperatureit 2 Rainfallit t (2) The dependent variable is also stature for individual i born in year t; temperature and rainfall indicate the mean temperature and rainfall in year t for the individual i. We use the same controls as in equation (1), denoted by Ω. Model 1 shows the full sample, model 2 only nonirrigated areas, and model 3 irrigated areas. Robust standard errors are also clustered at the grid level. The results, as presented in Table 3, are that warm temperatures and rainfall are positively related to heights in the irrigated areas and that rainfall is more necessary in the dry areas. They confirm A’Hearn’s previous claim that agriculture is more successful in warmer areas since “warm temperatures did permit irrigated cultivation of vineyards or olive and citrus groves,” and irrigation compensated for the lack of rain.33 According to Simpson, “the relatively high labour productivity in parts of the Mediterranean owed much to a combination of a warm climate, irrigation systems, artificial fertilisers and abundant labour which permitted the production of high value crops.” Despite the statistical insignificance of rainfall in nonirrigated areas, the p-value is very low 0.087 and statistically significant at 0.1. Hence, our models confirm that given the low rainfall patterns

33 A’Hearn, “The British Industrial Revolution,” in Floud, Jane Humphries, and Paul Johnson (eds.), The Cambridge Economic History of Modern Britain (New York, 2014), 26.

Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/jinh_a_01268 by guest on 24 September 2021 Table 3 Stature and Climate in the Region of València for the Cohorts Born between 1850 and 1949

TOTAL NONIRRIGATED IRRIGATED SAMPLE AREAS AREAS (1) (2) (3) Mean temperature 0.197*** 0.208 0.170** 0.044 0.129 0.052 Mean rainfall 0.006** 0.011 0.005 0.002 0.006 0.003 Elevation 0.000 −0.000 0.001 0.000 0.000 0.001 Population 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000 Illiteracy −1.018*** −0.980*** −1.050*** 0.157 0.036 0.205

BIRTH DECADE (REF. 1850) 1860 0.326* −4.945*** 0.407** 0.126 0.763 0.067 1870 0.148 −4.488*** 0.185 0.477 0.787 0.614 1880 1.658*** −4.607*** 1.823*** 0.287 0.708 0.274 1890 1.702*** −4.815*** 1.915*** 0.263 0.7559 0.137 1900 1.830*** −4.214*** 2.001*** 0.309 0.732 0.252 1910 2.464*** −3.506*** 2.602*** 0.355 0.719 0.356 1920 2.341*** −3.698*** 2.522*** 0.203 0.713 0.296 1930 3.368*** −2.140** 3.341*** 0.390 0.697 0.550 1940 4.114*** −1.651* 4.201*** 0.314 0.757 0.497

OCCUPATION (REF. HISCLASS 2: HIGHER PROFESSIONALS) Higher managers −1.074*** −1.347* −0.985* 0.230 0.530 0.324 Lower managers 0.249 0.393 0.224 0.186 0.640 0.242 Lower professionals, clerical, etc. 0.464 0.466 0.470 0.228 0.542 0.268 Lower clerical and salesmen −4.459 −0.697 −0.393 0.293 1.001 0.313 Medium-skilled workers 1.698*** 1.394* 1.817*** 0.209 0.616 0.266

Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/jinh_a_01268 by guest on 24 September 2021 Table 3 (Continued )

TOTAL NONIRRIGATED IRRIGATED SAMPLE AREAS AREAS (1) (2) (3) Farmers and ﬁshermen −2.124*** −2.558*** −1.986*** 0.264 0.590 0.318 Lower skilled workers −0.824*** −1.022 −0.740** 0.186 0.546 0.215 Lower-skilled farm workers −0.959*** −1.193 −0.848* 0.216 0.632 0.270 Unskilled workers −0.624* −0.995 −0.516 0.284 0.569 0.399 Unskilled farm workers −1.357*** −1.195 −1.401*** 0.192 0.599 0.139

PLACE OF MEASUREMENT (REF. CASTELLÓ DE LA PLANA) Alcoi 0.025 −0.099 0.248 0.190 0.494 0.276 Alcira 0.309 −0.477 0.398 0.195 0.525 0.262 Elx −0.218 −0.343 −0.411 0.171 0.592 0.268 Gandia 1.273*** 0.966* 1.308*** 0.110 0.438 0.132 Oriola 0.499*** 0.209 0.558*** 0.053 0.557 0.075 Pego 2.155*** 1.529* 3.524** 0.266 0.543 1.080 Requena 0.033 0.174 0.398 0.191 0.252 0.505 Sueca 0.688** −1.006 0.789*** 0.132 0.476 0.172 Villarreal 1.016*** 0.684 1.030*** 0.099 0.385 0.118 Villena 0.520** 0.531 0.866 0.145 0.360 1.895 Constant 161.044*** 166.954*** 161.294*** 0.781 2.012 0.832 Number of individuals 107,723 26,463 81,260 R-squared 0.078 0.084 0.077 *p< 0.05. **p< 0.01. ***p<0.001. NOTE Robust standard errors are clustered at the grid level.

Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/jinh_a_01268 by guest on 24 September 2021 HEIGHT AND CLIMATE IN SPAIN | 275 Fig.5 Interaction of Temperature and Precipitation with Birth Decade in Irrigated and Nonirrigated Areas, 1860–1940

NOTES The year 1950 was the reference year. Controls are the same as those in equation (1). Robust standard errors are clustered at the grid level.

in the region of València, the favorably warm temperatures were the region’s comparative advantage for the cultivation of highly valuable crops. The results about the impact of temperature on stature, although small, are statistically significant and plausible. We can attribute 0.2 cm of the height increase to the increase in temperature that was around 1°C during the period under review. The results of the additional controls, such as elevation and population size, are similar to those presented in Table 2 and are not discussed herein.34 Technophysio Evolution in Mediterranean Spain Finally, Figure 5 reports the beta coefficients of the interaction between stature and temperature and rainfall with the 95 percent confidence interval, using the same controls as in equation (2) with robust standard errors also clustered at the grid level. According to Fogel and Costa’sout- line of the theory of technophysio evolution for the last 300 years, particularly during the last century, humans have gained an unprec- edented degree of control over, and freedom from, the constraints of their environments, including climate. The interaction of climate with decade of birth clearly shows the extent to which humans have been able to take ever-more advantage of environmental features during the last decades, and how the relationship between climate variables and stature has changed over time.35

34 Simpson, Long Siesta, 256. 35 Robert Fogel and Dora Costa, “A Theory of Technophysio Evolution, with Some Implications for Forecasting Population, Health Care Costs, and Pension Costs,” Demography, XXXIV (1997), 49–66.

Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/jinh_a_01268 by guest on 24 September 2021 276 | GALOFRÉ-VILÀ, MARTÍNEZ-CARRIÓN, AND PUCHE The positive effects of temperature and precipitation increased over time, both in irrigated and nonirrigated areas, although in nonirrigated areas, the effect became less negative and nonsignificant statistically in the 1940s. This more positive effect was due to such effective coping strategies as advanced technology, reduced economic disparities between rural and urban populations, and improved labor conditions. An important change in the early twentieth century, associated with better farming practices and adaptation to environmental conditions, was the nutritional transition (changes in the composition of diet and food availability) that occurred in Spain from the 1920s to the 1930s. According to Cussó and Garrabou, the diet of the Spanish population did not begin to improve until the 1920s and 1930s, shifting from a monotonous regime of bread, potatoes, and legumes to a richer variety of meat, milk, animal fats, fruits, and vegetables. Climate was still statistically significant in the years after 1920. Its more positive impact was due to further climatic adaptation in agriculture and technological development in industry as part of Spain’s modernization and accelerated economic growth.36 During the 1920s and 1930s, Spain’s government also began to spendmoreonpublichealthandsafetynets,whichhelpedto overcome environmental and climatic penalties. Despite the Spanish Civil War (1936–1939) and its aftermath, new public-health initiatives (even if small) reduced the incidence of such infectious diseases as diarrhoea; by 1960, diarrhoea and enteritis represented just 1.6 percent of total deaths. Malaria was not eradicated until the 1930s after the establishment of the Dispensarios Antipalúdicos (anti-malaria centers), the draining of the marshes, and, eventually, the application of DDT. The literature also stresses the contribution of rural credit cooperatives to the financial and technological success of small farms during the first third of the twentieth century. The aim of these cooperatives was to alleviate financial hardships during periods of poor harvest, to facil- itate technical changes, and to improve access to product markets.37

36 Xavier Cussó and Garrabou, “The Nutritional Transition in Contemporary Spain: The Evolution of the Intake of Bread, Potatoes and Pulses (1850–2000),” Investigaciones de Historia Económica, III (2007), 69–100. 37 For government spending, see Espuelas Barroso, La Evolución del Gasto Social Público en España, 1850–2005 (Madrid, 2013); for the decline in diarrhea, Pérez Moreda, Reher and Sanz Gimeno, La conquista. Martínez-Soto, Martinez-Rodriguez, and Mendez, “Spain’s Develop- ment of Rural Credit Cooperatives from 1900 to 1936: The Role of Financial Resources and Formal Education,” European Review of Economic History, XVI (2012), 449–468.

Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/jinh_a_01268 by guest on 24 September 2021 HEIGHT AND CLIMATE IN SPAIN | 277 This article explores the extent to which short- and medium-term climatic changes in Mediterranean Spain between 1850 and 1949 were reflected in men’s height. Using a large collection of Spanish military recruits in València, we linked heights with new high- resolution, gridded climatic data about temperature and precipitation, and, with the aid of GIS software, matched individuals in the height sample with geographically indexed climatic data. Climate, however, is only one of the factors that can influence health; human welfare has important dimensions that are unrelated to it. This analysis shows that climate has its most meaningful effect on adult height in the year of birth. It also shows that the combination of modern agriculture and a warm climate not only conferred benefits on regional economic development; it also made men grow taller, especially those in irrigated rural areas. Furthermore, despite a lack of rain, and regardless of geography, new adaptive strategies after World War I (new seed varieties, irrigation, and refrigeration) interacted positively with the warm Mediterranean climate to improve nutrition. Thus, even the poor could secure a much more varied diet than that which was available to them at the start of the previous century. This article’s findings are particularly relevant for the current discussion about how climate affects developing areas such as sub- Saharan Africa and how to set developmental policy goals. Even poor, underdeveloped, and malnourished populations living on unproductive land with a shortage of rainfall, such as the Spaniards in the Region of València in the nineteenth century, can learn to take advantage of a warm climate and, through technological change and the cultivation of cash crops, to diversify their economies and start a process of fast growth.