Preface.- Introduction.- List of contributors.- Part 1 The European Background.- 1.1 Climate Change in Poland in the Past Centuries and its Relationship to European Climate: Evidence From Reconstructions and Coupled Climate Models.- 1.2 Historical Climate in Central Europe During the Last 500 Years.- 1.3 Climatic Variations in the East European Plain During the Last Millennium: state-of-the-art.- 1.4 The Climate of Europe in Recent Centuries in the Context of the Climate of Mid to High Latitude Northern Hemisphere from Borehole Temperature Logs.- Part 2 The Climate of Poland in Recent Centuries: A Synthesis of Current Knowledge .-2.1 Instrumental Observations - 2.2 Documentary Evidence.- 2.3 Dendrochronological Data.- 2.4 Geophysical Data .- 2.5 Summary and Concluding Remarks.- Part 3 The Climate of Poland and Europe in Recent Centuries: New Findings Results.- 3.1 Long-term Changes of Bioclimatic Conditions in Cracow (Poland).- 3.2 Climate Warming in the Czech Republic: Evidence Stored in Shallow Subsurface .- 3.3 History of the Gdansk Pre-instrumental and Instrumental Record of Meteorological Observations and Analysis of Selected Air Pressure Observations..- 3.4 A Composite Reconstruction of the Russian Arctic Climate Back to A.D. 1435.- 3.5 Growth/Climate Relationships in Tree-ring Widths of Picea abies in Lithuania and Poland.- 3.6 Multi-annual Variability of Cloudiness and Sunshine Duration in Cracow Between 1826 and 2005.- 3.7 Changes in Sea Surface Temperature of the South Baltic Sea (1854-2005).- 3.8 Ground Surface Temperature Histories Reconstructed from Boreholes in Poland: Implications for Spatial Variability.- 3.9 Precipitation Extremes and Disastrous Floods in Central Europe in July 1897.- 3.10 Summer Temperatures in the Tatra Mountains during the Maunder Minimum (1645-1715).- 3.11 Seasonal Differentiation of Maximum and Minimum Air Temperature in Cracow and Prague in the Period 1836-2007.- 3.12 Climate Changes in the Central and North-eastern Parts of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth from 1656 to 1685.- 3.13 The Climate of Polish Lands as Viewed by Chroniclers, Writers and Scientists.- 3.14 Observations and Measurements of Precipitation in the Polish Province of Galicia in the Nineteenth Century.- 3.15 Variability of the European Climate on the Basis of Differentiation of Indicators of Continentalism.- 3.16 The First One Hundred Years (1791-1890) of the Wroclaw Air Temperature.- Index.