Evidence for a hornbeam woodland from charcoal kilns in Meuse lowlands (northeastern France): past management record or local anomaly? - Archive ouverte HAL Accéder directement au contenu
Communication Dans Un Congrès Année : 2021

Evidence for a hornbeam woodland from charcoal kilns in Meuse lowlands (northeastern France): past management record or local anomaly?

Résumé

An anthracological study is being conducted in Meuse (northeastern France) to assess past forest resources exploitation to produce charcoal for local industries. The study area comprises 57 km 2 of mainly broadleaved-mixed forests in a lowland region with former royal (now state-owned), municipal and private forests. The analysis of airborne LiDAR images allowed to infer that there are around 2600 potential charcoal kilns in the area. The sampling campaigns yielded the validation of 285 platforms and 48 of them were sampled for charcoal remains in an area of 3.5km 2. Results from charcoal analysis provided the identification of 12 taxa being Carpinus betulus (hornbeam) the dominant taxon with over 66% of total diversity, followed by Fagus sylvatica (c. 12%) and Corylus avellana (c. 7%), Quercus sp. (3%) and the remaining taxa are residually represented. These results, especially the dominance of hornbeam relegating to a second plan the presence of Fagus and Quercus, appear to be in contradiction to the so far admitted forest trajectory in the area. Indeed, today lowland temperate forests in northeastern France are largely dominate by oak and beech woodlands. This was also the case in the past since, at least, the antiquity and, at least at regional scale. Several questions arise from this disparity between the dominance of oak and beech in the woodlands and their relative subrepresentation in the charcoal assemblage. Are they a consequence of a prioritization of understorey vegetation for charcoal production instead of oak and beech? or the display of former management practices (e.g. coppicing), while standing trees, possibly oak or beech, were reserved for other purposes? To develop these hypotheses, this study will be enriched with data from written sources since the 17th century onwards, allowing a better clarification of former woodland exploitation in the region, according local industrial development.
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Dates et versions

hal-03527735 , version 1 (18-01-2022)

Identifiants

  • HAL Id : hal-03527735 , version 1

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Cláudia Oliveira, Jonathan Bouquerel, Xavier Rochel, Simon Devin, Vincent Robin. Evidence for a hornbeam woodland from charcoal kilns in Meuse lowlands (northeastern France): past management record or local anomaly?. 27th Annual Meeting of the European Association of Archaeologists (online meeting), European Association of Archaeologists, Sep 2021, Kiel, Germany. ⟨hal-03527735⟩
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