Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
compost is best. Finally, the Geoponika links the moon
s cycle to agricultural
operations, again in accordance with Latin writers: manure should never be spread
during the waxing of the moon, as this would lead to more weeds.
From the literature as well as from the archaeological record it is quite evident
that techniques like terracing, irrigation or manuring were developed to a high
standard in the Mediterranean world of Antiquity and that much of this knowledge
and practice was carried on into the Middle Ages. Erosion did happen and was a
problem, a problem to which solutions were not abundant. Terracing was wide-
spread, but was costly and did not solve all erosion problems. While soil could be
collected downhill and carried back up, there was no way to prevent massive
erosion of cultivated landscapes which could come with only very few, but very
effective catastrophic torrential rainfalls spread over the centuries. The histories of
climate and soils are linked.
'
3.3.2.6 Europe North of the Alps
The practice of marling was, as Pliny the Elder reports in his encyclopedia, brought
to the Roman Empire from the north of Europe. Peasant societies had evolved to
some standard of fertilization techniques by the 1st century CE, manuring was, as
detailed above, common from the Bronze age onwards, and so was the generation
of anthrosols from adding grass sods to sandy soils, a technique leading to fertile
'
soils. For a long period, until the 14th century, knowledge about soil
management was not collected into the kind of manuals we know from Antiquity.
One has to turn to the various medieval encyclopedias about nature to
Plaggen
'
nd such
information. But besides orally transmitted local experiences the manuals of
antiquity, in particular Palladius, were relatively widespread, and translations of the
Latin texts began to appear as soon as the vernaculars became more important.
Agricultural manuals exist in all major European languages. One of the best was
written in German in the late 16th century, and it shall serve as the sole example of
a library
s worth of topics on the subject. Johannes Coler, son of a Lutheran
minister and a minister himself, was one of many churchmen who engaged in the
development of agriculture. He was born in Silesia, brought up in Berlin and later
had his own parish in Parchim in Brandenburg, in north-easter Germany. A learned
man, well versed in the languages of the Mediterranean agricultural treatises, Coler
was one of many early modern writers who adapted the knowledge produced for
condition of the Mediterranean to the different soils and climates of Europe north of
the Alps.
69
The
'
s Oeconomia (an agricultural calendar) was published in
1591, and its last parts were printed in 1606. During the 17th century alone this
multi-volume compendium enjoyed 14 reprints. Coler often notes differences
rst part of Coler
'
69
McDonald (
1908/1968
).
