The Italian Prealps are a natural passage between the alpine world and the Po plain. The highlands have always been easily reached from the Po plain, especially in the east, thanks to the gentle mountain ridges and the deep north-south valleys.
The eastern Italian Prealps have therefore been exploited from historical times to the present day for many purposes that are typical of a mountain zone: in the area between lake Garda and Brenta river, which is the focus of this paper, charcoal was made from wood, which was also used as building material; a poor agriculture was developed; mining activities were performed; stone quarry workers and stone dressers left remains of open quarries; during 18th and 19th centuries, the production of ice became important. The most important activity in the uplands was stock-raising from the 10th century shepherds have been using the high pastures, crossing the almost impassable woodland belt; during the 18th and 19th centuries, cattle husbandry prevailed over sheep rearing.
Ethnoarchaeological and archaeological projects have been carried out in the study area in order to detect and document the traces of human activities, especially shepherds and sheep farming. To date, it has been possible to locate hundreds of sheep folds, shepherds’ shelters and breeders’ houses in the uplands; to interview the last shepherds in the lowlands, which turn out to be complementary to the use of uplands for animal breeding; to discover that the most ancient traces of organized human exploitation in the uplands go back to the Bronze Age, while during the Iron Age a change in upland economy is evident, possibly connected with the organization of larger territorial communities and their boundaries; in Roman times the exploitation of uplands seem to be connected with a network of sanctuaries, inherited from the Iron age
