Human-Made Environments. The Development of Landscapes as ResourceAssemblages

Abstract

Landscapes bear traces of the use of resources over long periods. These reflect not only ways of using, shaping, organising, controlling and exchanging resources, but also knowledge, perceptions, motivations for actions and related social dynamics. Resources can be material as well as immaterial and constitute the basis for the development and decline of societies. They are usually not exploited in isolation, but as parts of complexes whose specific constellation in time and space can be best described as assemblages. This topic was the subject of the session ‘Human-Made Environments: The Development of Landscapes as Resource Assemblages’ held at the 24th Annual Meeting of the European Association of Archaeologists (Barcelona, 5–8 September 2018) and forms the basis of this volume. The general purpose is a debate on new concepts of the interrelation of social dynamics and resource use and a discussion of case studies in which landscapes were shaped to facilitate the utilisation of resources. The identification of what has been considered to be a resource is discussed as well as the means through which the corresponding landscapes were transformed and the results of these transformations. This implies not only material, but also spiritual aspects linked to the exploitation of resources. Since ResourceAssemblages are products of historical evolution and mutual relations the mechanisms of these processes are of great significance. Supreme aspects comprise the detection of a conscious human formation of landscapes in order to suit the exploitation of resources, the connected social practices as well as socio-cultural dynamics linked to the use of resources.