Recording the Landscape:
Cartography and the Mapping of Culture
The perception of landscape is a large and complex one who’s construal depends
on the researcher’s standpoint and well being. In this study, the draw near to
landscape centuries on what it can tell us about the relationship between the
human and natural environments. That relationship reflects responses to
environment such as the landscape as belongings and critique of trade, as the
natural space within which the ‘act of living’ takes place as well as a
reflection of the past and also an object of reminiscence (Stathatos 1996). The
growth and revolution of the landscape is a process of continuity in which the
social and physical forces interrelate. Human impacts on the landscape are, with
the passage of time, superimposed one upon the other, and the study of the
current situation is not enough to gain conclusions about the patterns and
contours of the landscape as well as their functions within the nearby
environments. As such, it is necessary to go back and look carefully through all
the facts available, from the range of sources in order fully to understand the
cultural landscape of today. This is neither simple nor easy, as E. W. B.
Russell (Russell 1997) puts it: ‘reconstructing the past to assess its effects
on the present ecosystems is like a mystery, where the researcher knows the
outcomes but not the rules’. Mediterranean landscapes, widely modified by human
bustle, with their long decision history characterized by the coexistence of
different cultures, provide an endless field for the examination of
human-environment relationships.
Order Your
Custom Term Papers, College Essays and Research Papers
In the past, when, in Greece, the population was strongly associated to local
resources, utilization of the natural environment shaped an essential part of
the conventional rustic economy. Over the grater part of rural Greece, the use
of coarse land (from deciduous or coniferous forest to scrubland, alpine
pastures and screens) as grazing for sheep and goats, provided profits for
people who might otherwise not be able to hold up themselves from the produce of
other inexpensive sources (Forbes 1997). In recent years, the form of Greece’s
undulating and hilly grazing areas has changed as a result of overgrazing in
some areas and under grazing in others. The occurrence results mainly from the
progressive depopulation of the more agriculturally trivial areas (Grivas 1998).
Cartography has been practiced since olden times. For many centuries its maximum
claim was the production of hand-drawn horizontal maps and charts assembled from
information collected visually by explorers, and other individuals. As a result,
they were not as precise as current maps, but are attractive as a record of the
level of knowledge and thought at the time. Map reproductions were also of great
worth because they were copied with hand.
The Cram Area
a) Locality and geographical direction
The cram area is part of Zagori, a broader area within the Pindos Mountains of
Epirus, in northwestern Greece (Figure 1). Zagori is an association of 45 small
villages, and is made up of three parts: East, West and Central Zagori.
According to the 1991 survey, the usual population of the whole area was 6.375
residents. In the past, for a long period during the Ottoman Empire Zagori used
to be an independent, self-ruled territory, but now forms part of the executive
region of Ioannina prefecture. Most of the villages still retain their
predictable architectural features. A network of covered mule tracks,
supplemented by stone bridges and stone stairs, is sound confirmation of the
human existence in the past, and moreover testifies to organization of the
surroundings by the natives.
b) The innate environment
The cram and its environs area are characterized by a pronounced liberation.
High mountains, vertical slopes, cliffs, profound gorges, and rock formations,
rivers, streams, as well as small valleys and alpine plateaus control it. The
environmental formations consist mainly of hard granite and mixed flushes. The
environment of the area is characterized as midway: from Mediterranean to
pleasant climate. The average yearly precipitation level exceeds 1200mm, while
during the summer months the rainfall averages around 119mm. The average yearly
temperature is 12.5° C.
The arrangement of the geographical situation, the geological symphony and
changes, the highly varied relief, the micro and macro climate, human activity
and the limited convenience of the area, have contributed to the development and
maintenance of unique highly rich ecosystems. The area contains a range of
habitats, and these in turn retain a wide variety of flora and fauna including
many rare kinds. In the area can be found: maquis shclyrophylous evergreen
plants, forests of deciduous oaks, spruce, pine and beech, alpine pastures and
prairies, vegetation on lime rocks, vegetation developed on cliffs, and river
bank shrubbery. The same degree of diversity characterizes the fauna of the area
2. The natural system of the area is highly valued, so that in 1973, fraction of
the area to be elected as one of the country’s National Parks.
Order Your
Custom Term Papers, College Essays and Research Papers
The Research Methods
A predominantly valuable source for the study of landscape change is an
amalgamation of maps and air photographs because they give the most realistic
facts of the land cover of the past. Unfortunately, the only old maps of the
area obtainable, are not detailed enough to provide productive judgment with
recent cartography. The earlier visual sources are consisted by air photographs
from the Second Word War. These, when compared with more recent maps and air
photographs provide facts of landscape change at exacting sites and help to
explain areas where changes can be recognized. Vegetation maps, produced by the
local forestry offices within their schedule reports, provide information about
the changes not only in the forest work but also about their influential
administration. Although, the information given by them is not always accurate,
these maps together with their written reports form records for more or less the
same area in usual terms, about every ten years.
A series of interviews with land users over the whole research area has been
decided upon in order to obtain a more detailed picture of the association
between land-management practices and features observed on the landscape today.
The interviews take the form of open conversations and intend to explore as much
as possible of the knowledge used in the supervision of the landscape and the
degree of insinuation of these practices. Landscape attribute observation will
be undertaken during complete field surveys following the guidelines of local
people; in addition the giving of forest officials in the area is considered
essential, and, therefore, a number of interviews with such officials are also
envisaged. Another source under deliberation is the study of old photographs
with landscape views. Where such photographs are available, that could prove to
be a valuable source of in sequence for fairly recent changes on the landscape.
The Animal Husbandry
Financial and communal systems often determine structures of landscape and their
components. By using past documents we can determine how these systems
interrelate with the natural environment. Exhaustive land-management practices
of the past in hilly areas recommend that these areas supported larger
populations than is the case today, not only of people but also of animals that
used to forage the public and shared land. The harsh weather conditions and the
usually limited accessibility of mountainous area in the past required people to
develop strategies for behind the limited food resources for themselves and
their animals. ‘Nobody could live in the village without keeping some domestic
animals as they provided the main resources of food for the family; for feeding
these animals they needed fodder’ (Lazaridis 1972). Also, the carry out of
transhumance is perhaps one of the adaptations of these communities in the face
of ecological conditions and the availability of the resources. Although this
system of recurrent grazing meant that the shepherds were able to provide food
for their livestock throughout the year, grazing inexorably had an impact on
vegetation.
Some of the effects are that the grazing animals harm the new branches or the
seedlings of natural rebirth by eating and trampling, thereby favoring the
production of meadow. Indirect effects are that people frequently retain a
number of species for pollarding and lopping or for the construction of fruit
used for feeding the animal.
Order Your
Custom Term Papers, College Essays and Research Papers
Evidence of Regeneration
The opening study of air photographs and field observations in the broader area
of Zagori has shown that natural revival is clearly ongoing. Large areas on
steeper or gentler slopes, previously under various uses such as promotion or
tree plantations, grazing or fodder cutting, or general forest utilization, are
steadily covered with vegetation. Data from several studies show that the
revival of pine trees in the broader area is prevalent. Mainly plentiful is the
natural revival of black pine, Pinus nigra, which tends to lead previously
covered by mixed Oak Forest (ETHIAGE 1996). These used to be areas, which were
managed for several uses, which are now vacant. Moreno (Moreno, Croce et al.
1993) referring to the case of Liguria in Italy writes concerning pine trees:
‘... in Liguria (pine) was commonly regarded in peasant society as a species
that invaded groves of sweet chestnut, figs and olives. This belief was
recorded, and shared, by authors such as Giacobbe (Giacobbe 1942) who reported a
local dialect proverb that ‘pine is the weed of woodland’.
The depopulation of the area and the desertion of past land use left behind
large strips of fruit trees within the forest species. Slopes secure the
villages are spread with larger or smaller clusters of cherry, apple, walnut, or
chestnut trees; remnants which testify the human involvement in the making of
the landscape. The survival and the management of these clusters are now under
deliberation therefore the recording and mapping of them are a qualification (Merztanis
2000).
National Park and Recent Management
In 1973, an area of 12,945 ha, in the northern part of the Zagori was elected as
National Park (ETHIAGE 1996). Above all the National Park was set aside for
maintenance interests but today, is increasingly providing with spare time
facilities and it is amongst the duties of the park establishment to provide for
public enjoyment (Kassioumis 1994).
The economies of the villages within the edge of the National Park are whether
directly or indirectly dependent upon the National Park and accordingly,
‘impinge upon’ its natural systems and resources. The protected position of the
park, like in other parks in Greece has caused pressures and led to conflicts,
which the current organization has failed to contain fruitfully (Kassioumis
1994). At the similar time, the Park’s easy accessibility, through the
obtainable road network from the villages in the fringe has radically reoriented
local economies in favor of a growing dependence on tourism. Visitors have been
estimated at 91,000 in 1994 but this figure is likely to be an underestimate and
perhaps exceeds 100,000 (Papageorgiou 1996).
The durable changes occurred in the area of the park as a result of people
utilization of the natural sources, have been overturned. The exorbitant
measures made by the park authorities eliminate the local people of the
management plan for the park area while the park is increasingly furnished with
leisure facilities. In addition, the effective security of Greek natural capital
is further hampered by a scarcity of funding, inefficient staff that is often
poorly trained in park management, and the ongoing absence of a designated state
management body.
Order Your
Custom Term Papers, College Essays and Research Papers
Conclusions
The manifestation of the landscape today is the result of the communication
between the physical and natural environment and the kind of human movement, the
historical period during which changes have been taking place, the culture and
the stage and progress of human knowledge and discovery. Over the long history
of human activity on the earth, many imprints on the landscape have changed.
However, ‘the effects of the past are still being felt in the present, even
where the reasons for the activities or even the activities themselves have been
forgotten’ (Russell 1997).
Historical documents represent evidence for reconstructing the past situation
and the human actions and attitudes that affected it. In any past study of a
literate period sources like travelers’ diaries and letters where they describe
the new lands they visit, peoples’ notes of their daily activities, statistics
about the land uses or inhabitants changes, all of these and more, present
unique information on human activities as well as provide the basic sequential
support for analyzing other kinds of data. However, these sources of information
cannot be used as direct statements of reality in the past but they can be
interpreted with attentiveness of potential bias. Historical documents as well
as other kinds of facts can be used for corroborating or refuting of the
statements.
A number of studies suggest that the past land-exploitation practices are
usually liable for today’s patterns of the landscape. Human influence on natural
succession has been exerted both directly, by favoring or hindering certain
features, and indirectly, through the variation of the physical environment.
Both kinds of action have been, in turn, controlled by the way natural resources
were managed to meet peoples’ needs. For example, a specialized form of forest
management developed alongside the system of transhumance and grazing. From the
beginning of the 20th century, the desertion or generalization of transhumance
practices has resulted in extensive spread of woodland by natural regeneration
in the abandoned pastures and arable lands as well as the increase of the
grazing density over particular areas. In addition, cessation of the traditional
pastoral practices and terraced agriculture result in a quick change in
undergrowth composition and of landscape mosaic owning to forest recovery.
Although, in some transitional phases land abandonment creates greater landscape
heterogeneity, ‘the succession moves so far that in less than a decade grass
layers be transformed into dense shrublands’ (Farina 1998). Therefore the study
of the factors that organize processes and patterns of ecosystems provide
motivating areas for research.
Works Cited
Saratsi, Eirini, “Assessing the Landscape Change & the Traditional Land
Management Practices in the Pindos Mountains of North West Greece”, University
of Nottingham http://www.ub.es/geoagr/302.PDF
Order Your
Custom Term Papers, College Essays and Research Papers
