ABSTRACT

This book is about the cultural-historic landscape and understanding and managing its heritage. On the European level the topicality of this theme is expressed by the European Landscape Convention and by the increasing need for integrative research. Against this background the Dutch archaeological-historical landscape is a point of reference to structure the exchange of information about it in Europe.

For the meaning of the word ‘landscape’ we use the definition in the European Landscape Convention: “‘Landscape’ means an area, as perceived by people, whose character is the result of the action and interaction of natural and/or human factors”. This view fits in with the basic recognition that heritage management becomes increasingly ‘the management of future change rather than simply the protection of the fabric of the past’. This presents us with a paradox, to protect or preserve our historic environment we have to collaborate with ‘outsiders’ and to make our expert knowledge suitable for policy and society.

In the PDL/BBO programme the Belvedere core concept ‘conservation through development’ has been adopted. By seeking new uses, old landscapes and buildings can be saved. The landscape-based approach is integrative research creating new insights from the integration of disciplinary knowledge. There is a need for integration between the cultural historic disciplines themselves and between these and other relevant disciplines. Two unifying concepts, ‘biography of landscape’ and ‘action research’, have been adopted to support the integration and to focus the PDL/BBO programme. The integrative approach requires a clear positioning of the involved disciplines, especially the historic ones, towards the paradigms that dominate their field. They have to accommodate the past time perspective of the archaeologicalhistorical landscape to its meaning for the present we live in and for the future.

The insights gained from the PDL/BBO programme presented here are structured by the interaction between knowledge, policy and imagination centred around the public representing the society we are part of. The added value of considering themes in the wider European dimension is substantial. By sharing, confronting and comparing, the similarities and differences become clear and meaningful.