The Evolution of the Cultural Mediterranean Landscape in Israel as Affected by Fire, Grazing, and Human Activities
نویسندگان
چکیده
The early evolution of the cultural Mediterranean landscape in Israel, with special reference to Mt. Carmel, is described with a holistic landscape-ecological systems approach as the coevolution of the paleolithic food gathererhunter and his landscapes. In addition to archeological findings and our research on fire ecology and the comparative dynamics of Mediterranean landscapes in Israel and California, we made use of new insights into the selforganization of living systems and landscapes and the theory of nonlinear general evolution. From the Middle Pleistocene onward, this process occurred in two major bifurcations; one in which the pristine forest landscape was converted by human land uses and by natural and intentional set fires into a more open subnatural landscape, and then from the Upper Pleistocene onward into a grass-rich, seminatural, landscape mosaic. The final stage of this coevolution was reached more than 10,000 years ago by the advanced epipaleolithic, preagricultural Natufians, whose rich culture and intensive land use have a striking resemblance with those of the pre-European central coastal California Indians. During the third major bifurcation of the Neolithic agricultural revolution, arable seminatural landscapes were converted into agropastoral ones. The coevolutionary symbiotic relationship was replaced by human dominance leading to intensive land uses including burning and grazing. This period is missing from Californian landscapes, 'jumping' almost directly into the agroindustrial age and, therefore, apparently also lacking the great regeneration capacities and adaptive resilience acquired by Mediterranean landscapes. S.P. Wasser (ed.), Evolutionary Theory and Processes: Modern Horizons, Papers in Honour of Eviatar Nevo Z. Naveh and Y. Carmel. The Evolution of the Cultural Mediterranean Landscape in Isreal as Affected by Fire, Grazing, and Human Activities, 337-409. © 2003 Kluwer Academic Publishers. Printed in the Netherlands 338 Zev Naveh and Yohay Carmel
منابع مشابه
Shifting Mosaics in Semi-Steppe Rangelands Driven by Interactive Effect of Human Made Disturbances
Semi-steppe rangelands are a complex, highly dynamic and often multi-layered mosaic of grassland, shrubland, and intermediate communities. A few recent studies have explicitly or implicitly developed synthetic hypotheses about how interactive effects of human made disturbances initiate dynamic changes in plant community composition to cause a shifting mosaic of vegetation pattern across the lan...
متن کاملShifting Mosaics in Semi-Steppe Rangelands Driven by Interactive Effect of Human Made Disturbances
Semi-steppe rangelands are a complex, highly dynamic and often multi-layered mosaic of grassland, shrubland, and intermediate communities. A few recent studies have explicitly or implicitly developed synthetic hypotheses about how interactive effects of human made disturbances initiate dynamic changes in plant community composition to cause a shifting mosaic of vegetation pattern across the lan...
متن کاملHuman Functions in Landscape Design Based on human oriented design process
Functions in landscape design include values in design and management process to satisfy moral and environmental needs that current attitudes see that as open space design by natural and man-made elements, while the basic intellectual layers related to human as the principles of environmental desi...
متن کاملMultivariate analysis of landscape wildfire dynamics in a Mediterranean ecosystem of Greece
This paper focuses on spatial distribution of long-term fire patterns versus physical and anthropogenic elements of the environment that determine wildfire dynamics in Greece. Logistic regression and correspondence analysis were applied in a spatial database that had been developed and managed within a Geographic Information System. Cartographic fire data were statistically correlated with basi...
متن کاملMediterranean herbaceous vegetation response to high animal density and grazing deferment: Implications for management and conservation
Widely -contrasting stocking rates and grazing schedule treatments were imposed upon a Mediterranean herbaceous community in northern Israel. Botanical composition was monitored for 3 years. The vegetative community was found to be highly resilient to the treatments. Perennial grasses and legumes were among the resilient plants. These results are consistent with the view that Mediterranean ecos...
متن کامل