Researchers of the UB collaborate with French research centres to study the origin of mountain landscapes in Cantal
A team of the UB made up of Santiago Riera and Yolanda Llergo, researchers of the Seminar of Studies and Prehistoric Research (SERP), which is directed by professor Josep Maria Fullola, take part in a research project in collaboration with the laboratory GEOLAB (CNRS-University Blaise Pascal) and the Research Centre of Quantitative History (CNRS-University of Caen) in order to determine the origin of the mountain landscapes in Cantal (France) and find out how they have been shaped by farming practices since prehistoric times. Historians, archaeologists, paleoenvironmentalists and botanists collaborate together in the project with the aim of tracing the history of farming, mountain pasturelands and the origins of cheese production in the region. The mountains in Cantal, in Auvergne region, in the Massif Central, are known worldwide for its cheese specialities.
A team of the UB made up of Santiago Riera and Yolanda Llergo, researchers of the Seminar of Studies and Prehistoric Research (SERP), which is directed by professor Josep Maria Fullola, take part in a research project in collaboration with the laboratory GEOLAB (CNRS-University Blaise Pascal) and the Research Centre of Quantitative History (CNRS-University of Caen) in order to determine the origin of the mountain landscapes in Cantal (France) and find out how they have been shaped by farming practices since prehistoric times. Historians, archaeologists, paleoenvironmentalists and botanists collaborate together in the project with the aim of tracing the history of farming, mountain pasturelands and the origins of cheese production in the region. The mountains in Cantal, in Auvergne region, in the Massif Central, are known worldwide for its cheese specialities.
The French team, made up of Yanncik Miras and Fréderic Sumerly, of GEOLAB, in the city of Clermont-Ferrand, in the Auvergne region, and Violaine Nicolas, of the Research Centre of Quantitative History, carries out the archaeological and historical research which has brought to light evidence of farming practices in these mountains in prehistoric times, and has proved that the impact of the human activity is still visible in the current landscape. Deforestation in altitudinal areas can be observed since Protohistory, when pasturelands were created. Farming gradually became an essential activity in the region during the Middle Ages and especially in the Early modern period, when farming practice is recorded, which represents the origin of current uses and productions.