The Sustainability of Settlement and Exploitation of Liminal Coastal Environments in the North Sea Region, c. 1150-1400

英国低洼的沿海湿地面临着气候变化和海平面上升的相关威胁。这些问题在罗姆尼沼泽尤为严重，这是肯特郡西南部面积约260平方公里的盐沼和淡水沼泽混合区域。在公元前1150年以前，罗姆尼沼泽的定居在很大程度上仅限于零星的季节性活动。在此之后，人们转向全年开发沼泽地，这可能部分导致或加剧了1250年和1287-88年的一系列毁灭性洪水事件。我的论文将探讨过去的洪水经历和随后的社会反应，从而评估人为因素在破坏沼泽环境中的作用。此外，我将调查机构在改变中世纪景观，其资源的使用，以及这种转变与沼泽地的新开发关系的原因。跨学科方法将利用一系列资源，包括教区建筑环境，法律文件和土壤调查，收集土地使用，所有权和定居模式的定量数据。这将使中世纪人类与环境的关系重新概念化。由于湿地是一种重要的自然资源，因此迫切需要这样的研究来提供对当前生态危机的看法。然而，它所依赖的部分证据——罗姆尼·马什的中世纪农田系统——正迅速被20世纪60年代后地区农业政策从放牧方式转向耕作方式的转变所侵蚀。因此，当前的农业实践和沼泽地不稳定的生态使这项研究显得尤为及时。

Britain's low-lying coastal wetlands face the related threats of climatic change andrising sea levels. These problems are particularly acute in Romney Marsh, aregion of combined salt and freshwater marsh covering c. 260 km2 in southwesternKent. Before c. 1150, settlement of Romney Marsh had largely beenlimited to sporadic seasonal occupation. After this point, there was a shift towardsyear-round marshland exploitation which may have partly caused or exacerbateda series of devastating flooding episodes in 1250 and 1287-88. My thesis willexplore this past experience of flooding and the subsequent societal response,enabling an assessment of the anthropogenic role in destabilising marshlandenvironments. Additionally, I will investigate where agency lies in transforming themedieval landscape, use of its resources, and the cause of this shift towards anew exploitative relationship with marshland. An inter-disciplinary approach willutilise a range of sources, including the parochial built environment, legaldocuments, and pedological surveys, to gather quantitative data on land use,ownership and settlement patterns. This will enable a reconceptualisation ofhuman relationships with the environment during the Middle Ages. Such researchis urgently needed to provide perspective on the current ecological crisis becausemarshlands are a critical natural resource. However, part of the evidence uponwhich it relies, Romney Marsh's medieval field system, is fast being eroded by apost-1960s shift in regional farming policy from pastoral to arable methods.Consequently, current agricultural practices and the marshland's unstable ecologymake this research particularly timely.