Historical ecology is an interdisciplinary field of study connecting humanities and natural sciences. It deals with the historical influence of humans on ecosystems and vice versa. The time period covered starts when we are able to at least indirectly detect the influence of humans on nature and ends in the present. In other words, historical ecologists are interested in the entire Holocene. Historical ecology uses various sources information: fossil records (such as pollen or molluscs), archival documents (written sources and maps), climatic measurements, botanical and zoological sources, aerial photos and satellite images, archaeological landscape features etc.

What we understand by historical ecology largely depends on the context. This discipline is rather new and hardly institutionalised, therefore its definition is fluid. Differences in opinion result from disciplinary traditions and geographical distance. Historical ecology has a slightly different meaning in the humanities and the natural sciences, as well as in Europe and North America. We believe that such differences are not very important: as long as the questions are common, all approaches can be relevant.

In Europe, historical-minded investigations of human-nature interactions started in the 1950s, when the first such publications appeared in Great Britain. Basic works nowadays considered as classics were written in the 1970s and 80s. In Central Europe, however, the historical ecological approach has not received much attention until recently.

This site provides general information about historical ecology as well as about particular research projects in the field. The first such project is entitled “Lowland woodland in the perspective of historical development,” carried out at the Institute of Botany, Czech Academy of Sciences since 2008. The participants of this project created and maintain this website. As a result, the site presently focuses on the historical ecology of woodlands.