Investigating rural change. Legal access rights and changing lifestyles in rural mountain communities (Ligurian Apennines, Italy, 16th-21st centuries)

Abstract

The paper focuses on the strong relationship between changes in legal access rights to land, environmental resource management, as well as organization and lifestyles of past rural societies. The problem will be addressed through case studies derived from research projects in Southern Europe that rely on archaeological and historical research methods. The focus will be on the Ligurian Apennines in northwest Italy. I will demonstrate how changes in environmental resource management are recorded both inside and outside settlements, through archaeological and architectural study and through the landscape and environmental archaeology; I also examine how parallel changes in rural lifestyle can be tackled with these approaches. Particular attention will be paid to the period between the 18th and 20th centuries, when important transformations occurred related to access rights to common lands. The consequences of those changes played a leading role in the construction of rural landscapes that today are preserved as natural and cultural heritage.

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