Historical Waterscapes in Crosscultural Perspective

This workshop aims at a comparative study of historical waterscapes indifferent sites across the world by looking at the epistemological connectionbetween cosmological and ecological knowledge in water-landscapes engineering. Indoing so, we intend to addresses one of the most urgent questions of today’shydrogeology, which relates to the natural-cultural nexus, as indicated in theIX strategic plan of the UNESCO Intergovernmental Hydrological Program: “Whatis the role of water in… the dynamics of human civilization, and what are theimplications for contemporary water management?” (IHP-IX Strategic Plan, Annex2, n. 23). The main goal is to study water heritage as an open-ended historicalgeo-anthropological process, comprehend the current conjuncture, marked bysocio-ecological unbalances, and assess alternative pathways to a sustainablefuture. The water-cycle, seen from a historical and anthropological perspectiveshould open up new meaningful pathways, which are apt to address theenvironmental crisis of the Anthropocene by crossdisciplinarily integrating theagendas of socio-hydrology and hydro-sociology.

Waterscapes transformation, especially through their constantengineering, aims to secure various social uses of water (access to drinkablewater, agriculture, health, transportation, energy, defense, recreation), hasalways rested on complex forms of ecological, social and cosmologicalknowledge. Land surveying and cosmographic knowledge, including astronomy, havealways played an entangled role, although the scientific activity of theagrimensor (or land surveyor) and the astronomer/cosmographer have often beensegregated in accordance with epistemological and social divisions of labor.Medieval and early-modern India is a case in point, as the mathematicalpractices connected with astronomy and surveying were organized alongside casteand linguistic separations (Senthil Babu D. 2022). In early-modern Europe, thepractices of water management, hydrology, territory mapping and cosmologicalinquiry often merged, in line with political and economic drivers of productivity,control and efficiency. In early-modern Venice, cosmological knowledgeconstituted an essential basis for territory management and waterscapesarchitecture, as is witnessed by the scientific activity of the water officersof the Republic of Venice on matters as varied as territory mapping, tidalstudies, and eco-hydraulic engineering (canalization, coastal areasinterventions, lagoon management, fishing regulations) (Omodeo and Trevisani2022). European early-modernity also witnessed to the rise of new mixedintellectual-practical professionals, in line with the requirements of aprocess of societal restructuring (marked by technological innovations,capital-oriented forms of investment, novel forms of land and labour valuation,and colonial expansion). In this context, of an increasingly interconnectedmodernity, the commonalities and specificities of water-and-territoryscientific practices can only be understood through historical and comparativestudies. The case of Mexico City, former Aztec capital Tenochtitlan, shows theparallel and different evolution of an island-city that has been transformed ina very different direction than Venice for different geoengineering andpolitical decisions on the part of the Hispanic colonizers and the post-colonialengineers (Rodríguez-Camarena 2023). More comparative studies are necessary:the socio-political history of Chinese rivers management ought to be carefullyconsidered, too (Mostern 2021). This conference in historical geoanthropology aimsto strengthen a productive interdisciplinary and crosscultural exchange among scholarson questions of environmental history, water heritage, and sustainabledevelopment. The theoretical framework will also be addressed. It addressescrucial questions of historical geo-anthropology, conceived of as anenvironmental development of historical and political epistemology (Renn 2020and Omodeo-Garau-Rispoli 2023).

Moreover, the geomorphologicalrelevance of our historical inquiry into landscapemanagement needs to be stressed. Landscape practices such as deforestation,agriculture, and land reclamation, are strictly linked not only to surfacewater but also to groundwater exploitation. Human agency and hydrologicalprocesses also imply multiple processes of sediment dynamics such as soilerosion, landslides, and deposition. Accordingly, a historical analysis ofwater management ought to take into account geomorphological and land-usemodifications as anthropic alterations of the waterscapes. The analysis of historicalwaterscapes should also make the derivation of quantitative andsemi-quantitative information on geoenvironmental processes and driverspossible. This kind of geoenvironmental information is fundamental for thediachronic spatial analysis of the geoenvironmental dynamics in the long-term.Geomorphological modifications, relative sea level variations, hydrologicmeasures, and extreme events are examples of precious information that can bederived. On one hand, this typology of information provides objectiveinformation to interpret geo-anthropological dynamics; on the other, itprovides information for the Earth-sciences community, which are fundamental inorder to analyze and model geoenvironmental dynamics in the long term.

A group of scholars belonging to the network of the Max Planck PartnerGroup The Water City (Ca’ Foscari University of Venice and Max PlanckInstitute for the History of Science in Berlin) will present their research onthe social history of hydrology and cosmography in the longue durée in theVenice area and comparative sites. Their research also connects with research thatis conducted in the framework of the FARE Project EarlyGeoPraxis (fundedby the Italian Ministry of University and Research), the NICHE Center forEnvironmental Humanities and the UNESCO Chair of Water Heritage andSustainable Development in Venice. Specific attention will be devoted tohistory and knowledge theory, as is currently developed by the VerumFactumnetwork of political epistemology.