Landscape and Change in Early Medieval Italy

Chestnuts, Economy, and Culture

Paolo Squatriti

• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Year: 2013
• ISBN:
  9781107240605
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: European History
• Index: History

This innovative environmental history of the long-lived European chestnut tree and its woods offers valuable perspectives on the human transition from the Roman to the medieval world in Italy. Integrating evidence from botanical and literary sources, individual charters and case studies of specific communities, the book traces fluctuations in the size and location of Italian chestnut woods to expose how early medieval societies changed their land use between the fourth and eleventh centuries, and in the process changed themselves. As the chestnut tree gained popularity in late antiquity and became a valuable commodity by the end of the first millennium, this study brings to life the economic and cultural transition from a Roman Italy of cities, agricultural surpluses and markets to a medieval Italy of villages and subsistence farming.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Landscape and Change in Early Medieval Italy
• Title
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• Maps
• Preface
• Abbreviations
• Introduction: Trees, woods, and chestnuts in early medieval Italy
• Chapter 1 A natural history of the chestnut
• Chapter 2 The triumph of a tree
• Chapter 3 The poetics of the chestnut in the early Middle Ages
• Chapter 4 Chestnuts in early medieval Campania
• Chapter 5 Chestnuts in the Po valley
• Conclusion: Giovanni Pascoli and the old chestnut
• Glossary
• Primary sources
• Secondary sources
• Bibliography
• Index