Glossary on agricultural landscapes

The following glossary of terms related to the European agricultural landscape shall serve as a common basis for all parties, working in or on agricultural landscapes. Some of the terms are quite common and sometimes used in our every day language, but they often have different meanings in particular countries. These differences may be a result of varying linguistic developments, history and traditions. The glossary contains 40 terms in seven languages; English, Dutch, Estonian, French, German, Hungarian and Spanish. Each term begins with an English definition, illustrated by a photograph. If there are differences in meanings and connotations of single countries, they are mentioned in the designated country’s column. This work is to be continued

HERCULES: studying long-term changes in Europe’s landscapes

This paper presents the outlines of a new EU-funded research program for the long-term history, present-day management and further development of the European landscapes, including their natural and cultural heritage: HERCULES. One of the subprojects of this program (Work Package 2) links archaeological, historical and historical ecological data to the analysis of geo-information in order to develop models of long-term landscape change in three carefully chosen study regions in the Netherlands, Sweden and Estonia. This is framed theoretically by integrating insights from landscape biography, historical ecology and complex systems theory. The linking and analysis of data will be done using a Spatial Data Infrastructure and by means of dynamic modelling