Interglacials

Also: Last Interglacial, Eemian

During the last 1.2 million years, Earth's climate has changed in cycles lasting roughly 100,000 years. Over thousands of years, Earth moved repeatedly between a cold "ice age" state called a glaciation, and a warm state called an interglacial.

Historically, glacial periods have lasted much longer than interglacials. The current interglacial (called the Holocene) has lasted over 11,000 years; the previous one (called the Last Interglacial, LIG or Eemian) is dated approximately from 129,000 to 116,000 years ago.