Deforesting the Earth: From Prehistory to Global Crisis, An Abridgment

563 Pages·2006·5.08 MB·English

by  Michael Williams

DEFORESTING THE EARTH

DEFORESTING EARTH
THE
From Prehistory to Global Crisis
An Abridgment
Michael Williams
The University of Chicago Press
Chicago and London
Michael Williams is emeritus professor of geography at the University of Oxford and a
Fellow of Oriel College. He is the author, most recently, of Americans and Their Forests:
A Historical Geography as well as the editor of Wetlands: A Threatened Landscape and
coeditor of A Century of British Geography.
The University of Chicago Press, Chicago 60637
The University of Chicago Press, Ltd., London
© 2006 by The University of Chicago
All rights reserved. Published 2006
Printed in the United States of America
15 14 13 12 11 10 09 08 07 06 1 2 3 4 5
ISBN: 0-226-89947-0 (paper)
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Williams, Michael, 1935 June 24–
Deforesting the earth : from prehistory to global crisis : an abridgment / Michael Williams.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN: 0-226-89947-0 (pbk. : alk. paper)
1. Forests and forestry—History. 2. Clearing of land—History. 3. Deforestation—
History. I. Title.
SD131. W53 2006
333.75(cid:2)1309—dc22
2005034150
(cid:3)
The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of the American
National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library
Materials, ANSI Z39.48–1992.
For Loré,
once again

CONTENTS
List of Illustrations ix
Preface xv
PART I CLEARING IN THE DEEP PAST
1 The Return of the Forest 3
2 Fire and Foragers 12
3 The First Farmers 35
4 The Classical World 62
5 The Medieval World 87
PART II REACHING OUT: EUROPE AND THE WIDER WORLD
6 Driving Forces and Cultural Climates, 1500–1750 127
7 Clearing in Europe, 1500–1750 150
8 The Wider World, 1500–1750 191
9 Driving Forces and Cultural Climates, 1750–1900 226
10 Clearing in the Temperate World, 1750–1920 263
11 Clearing in the Tropical World, 1750–1920 318
PART III THE GLOBAL FOREST
12 Scares and Solutions, 1900–1944 359
13 The Great Onslaught, 1945–95: Dimensions of Change 395
14 The Great Onslaught, 1945–95: Patterns of Change 431
Epilogue: Backward and Forward Glances 471
Acknowledgments 479
List of Measures, Abbreviations, and Acronyms 481
Notes 483
Bibliographic Essay 505
Index 511

ILLUSTRATIONS
PLATES
2.1 Firing vegetation for cropping, Central African Republic 16
3.1 Regenerated tropical forest around the Mayan temples
at Tikal, Mexico 51
3.2 Town of Secota, Virginia, circa 1620 57
5.1 Cutting Wood, eleventh century 93
5.2 Swine Feeding in the Forest, eleventh century 113
5.3 The Hunt in the Forest by Paolo Uccello, circa 1470 115
5.4 European mine, sixteenth century 118
6.1 Frontispiece from Jan van de Straet’s Nova Reperta, 1600 130
7.1 Winter Landscape by Lucas I. van Valckenborch, 1586 161
7.2 Charcoal making 168–69
7.3 Fuelwood cutters at work in a coppice, eighteenth century 173
7.4 An eighteenth-century shipyard 175
7.5 Timber owner, agent, and merchant, eighteenth century 177
7.6 Consequences of deforestation, 1601 182–85
7.7 Reforestation 187
7.8 The cult of trees: Blenheim Palace and its grounds 189
8.1 Water-powered engenho, Olinda, Brazil 199
8.2 Backwoods Life in New England, 1770 206
8.3 The Beginning, eighteenth century 210
9.1 Logjam in a river, Minnesota, circa 1920s 246
9.2 Boom being towed by steam tug, Rainy Lake, Ontario,
circa 1920s 247
9.3 Rafting yellow poplar logs, Big Sandy River, Ohio, circa 1920s 248
9.4 Logging railroad, Arkansas, circa 1904 250
10.1 Land Improvement, 1853 265
10.2 “The Fighting Temeraire”Tugged to Her Last Berth to Be Broken
Up by J. M. W. Turner, 1838 280
ix