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The ideas and practices that comprise “conservation” are often assumed to have arisen within the last two centuries. However, while conservation today has been undeniably entwined with processes of modernity, its historical roots run much deeper. Considering a variety of preindustrial European settings, this book assembles case studies from the medieval and early modern eras to demonstrate that practices like those advocated by modern conservationists were far more widespread and intentional than is widely acknowledged. As the first book-length treatment of the subject, Conservation’s Roots provides broad social, historical, and environmental context for the emergence of the nineteenth-century conservation movement.
“The volume reflects great editorial care. Almost every study supports the main thesis of the collection, which is that while there was a clear tendency for sustainable forest (land) and water resource management in pre-modern times, this motivation was social and economic, rather than ecological. Not only do the papers implicitly communicate with each other, but they also refer to each other, pointing to the commonalities or differences in practices in the areas studied. With very few exceptions, the papers draw on archival material that in many cases had seldom been studied previously, and even those that build on printed sources raise new perspectives and pose different questions than previous authors. Accordingly, the volume will undoubtedly become one of the key references in pre-modern sustainability studies.” • Historical Studies on Central Europe
“The essays in Conservation’s Roots represent a thoughtful and compelling contribution to the field. They continue the scholarly conversation about the importance of pre-modern history to understanding sustainability, conservation, and the degrees to which people have both influenced their environments and understood the scale and import of their interventions.” • Ellen Arnold, Ohio Wesleyan University
“This collection is valuable and timely, with fresh insights in abundance. It will serve as an excellent reader for students and scholars of environmental history, as both a contribution to scholarship in its own right and a point of entry into the specialist literature.” • Angus J L Winchester, Lancaster University
List of Illustrations
Acknowledgements
Introduction
Richard Keyser and Abigail P. Dowling
Part I. Multiple-Use Resource Management in Preindustrial Societies: Pigs, Parks, Game, and Heathlands
Chapter 1. Controlling Pigs in Countryside and City for Sustainable Medieval Agriculture
Dolly Jørgensen
Chapter 2. Sustainability and Natural Resource Management at Hesdin, Artois, France, 1302–1329
Abigail P. Dowling
Chapter 3. Eating Your Game and Having It Too: North-Central Italian Conservation of Game Animals and Birds, 1300–1550
Cristina Arrigoni Martelli
Chapter 4. Sustaining Premodern Heathlands (1400–1750): Collective Knowledge and Peasant Communities in the Campine, Belgium
Maïka De Keyzer
Part II. The Governance of Aquatic Resources: Fishing and Flowing Freshwater
Chapter 5. Fisheries Regulations in Late Medieval Europe: Authorities, Concerns, Measures
Richard C. Hoffmann
Chapter 6. Managing the Lake Constance Fisheries, ca. 1350–1800
Michael Zeheter
Chapter 7. Keep the Water Flowing! Premodern Swedish Water Management
Eva Jakobsson
Part III. The Deep Roots of Woodland Conservation
Chapter 8. The Medieval Roots of Woodland Conservation: Northern France and Northwestern Europe, ca. 1100-1500
Richard Keyser
Chapter 9. Managing Southern French Forests under—and before—Colbert: Between Law and Custom, ca. 1500-1700
Sébastien Poublanc
Chapter 10. Conserving the ‘Vert’ in Early Modern Sherwood Forest
Sara Morrison
Chapter 11. Sustainability Prior to Carlowitz’s Sylvicultura? A Study Based on Cases from Schleswig-Holstein
Oliver Auge
Chapter 12. Traditional Woodland Management, Forest Legislation, and Modern Nature Conservation in East-Central Europe
Péter Szabó
Afterword
Paul Warde
Index