Understanding where we are now, so we can plan for the

future

Evolution of the rural landscape of Great Britain

All about meanings

In reverse order:

• Great Britain - why the geographical restriction?

• Landscape - what does it really mean?

• Rural - what does that mean?• Evolution - can a landscape evolve?

Great Britain: the major island of the archipelago of the British Isles

• It is home to most of us

• It is an island• Its landscape has a

recognised “starting point”

• It has some of the most varied landscapes in the world

During the last Ice Age

• Britain and Ireland part of continental Europe

• Most of the “country” under kilometres of ice

• The ice retreated approximately 10,000 years ago

• The land was scraped clean rock

10,000 years agomodern people arrived

• Sea levels rose +100m• Ireland became an

island first and still has far fewer native species as a result

• Great Britain was populated by Neolithic hunter-gatherers

• The English Channel cut off Great Britain around 8,000 years ago

• Great Britain approximately 5,000 years ago

• A forested island with a very small population of hunter gatherers.

• This “wildwood” is considered the “natural state” of the British landscape prior to the arrival of agriculture

After Rackham 1997 p 34

Wildwood no longer exists in Great Britain

Bialowieza National Park, Poland

• Agriculture changed everything

• European agriculture grew from its invention in Iraq around the end of the Ice Age in northern Europe

• It arrived in Britain around 6,000 years ago, after it became an island

• Southern Britain became one of the major grain and wool producing provinces of the Roman Empire

• The basic nature of the current British landscape was established then.

Source UCL 2009

The British Landscape

• Naturally forested• Heavily modified by human activity

– Clearing– Cropping– Grazing– Draining– Building…

What does Landscape mean?

• Some general definitions– an expanse of scenery that can be seen in a single view – painting depicting an expanse of natural scenery – an extensive mental viewpoint; "the political landscape

looks bleak without a change of administration

• Scientific definitions:– Any combinations of ecological, environmental and

geographical systems which are in equilibrium. Combinations of plants, animals, climate and geography which are only found in certain places and not elsewhere

• None of these is what we mean when we talk about landscape management.

Characteristic landscape

• In the context of land management, landscape can be defined as:

– A contiguous area of land of any size which has common characteristics throughout its extents which distinguish it from other areas of land.

Types of characteristic landscapes

• A characteristic landscape usually has a qualifying descriptor, e.g.– a forest landscape– an industrial landscape– a pastoral landscape– a polluted landscape

Defining the landscape character

• All land is part of one or more landscapes– An area of cultivated land in Wales might be

seen as part of a farming landscape and of a mountain landscape

• A land manager is usually predominantly interested in one character landscape

• You will be primarily interested in the rural landscape

What does Rural mean?

• Countryside?• Farmland?• Forests?• In America: officially areas with less

than 250 people per km2

• OED “in or of or suggesting country”

Global landscape

Terrestrial landscape

Managed landscape

Built landscapeNested landscapes

RuralRural

UrbanUrban

NaturalNatural

AquaticAquatic

Landscapes are not simple, nested shapes

Rural landscapes

• Managed, non-urbanised landscapes– Agriculture– Forestry– Grasslands– Moorlands– Water collection– Small built areas– Transport networks

Can non-living landscapes evolve?

• Some definitions of evolution– A gradual process in which something changes into

a different and usually more complex or better form – The process of developing– A movement that is part of a set of ordered

movements

• Systems subject to selective temporal change– Some changes are successful and lead to further

change– Some changes are unsuccessful and lead nowhere

Landscapes do evolve

• Landscapes change over time• Natural selection would result in Great

Britain returning to its primeval forested state

• Human selection, often unwitting, results in the varied, changing landscapes we see today

• Landscape management is the intentional, professional attempt to manage that selection process

The evolution and perception of the rural landscape of Great

Britain

Further reading

• Rackham, O. (2003) An Illustrated History of the Countryside 3rd ed Orion Publishing Co

• John Piper on linehttp://www.johnpiper.org.uk