Introduction
The European oak chronologies were completed back to 5000 BC during the 1980s, with demonstrable replication between Ireland and Germany using stepwise correlation through long English bog-oak series (Pilcher et al. 1984; Baillie 1995). Longer German oak chronologies extend the annual record back to 10,430 BP (Friedrich et al. 1999). This suite of chronologies, and their consti tnent site chronologies, even individual trees, can he analysed for changes in common response to the environment through time and of course can be cornpared with other well-dated time series from around the world.