Recent summers in Europe were likely the warmest in the last 2,000 years

New research published in the journal Environmental Research Letters by 45 scientists from 13 countries has determined that recent strong, summer warming over most of Europe during the past several decades was likely the warmest such period of the last two millennia.
Temperature anomalies of a western European heat wave from last summer.

Temperature anomalies of a western European heat wave from last summer

The research team used tree-ring data and historical documentary evidence to derive a new European summer temperature reconstruction, according to the EurekAlert article.

For example, the study abstract notes that the 1st century (100 year period) European temperatures may have been slightly warmer than the 20th century, but the difference is not statistically significant.

However, recent summers have been unusually warm in the context of the last two millennia and there are no 30 year periods in either reconstruction that exceed the mean average European summer temperature of the last three decades (1986-2015).

Source by:http://www.accuweather.com/en/weather-blogs/climatechange/recent-summers-in-europe-were/55130935