Excerpt
THE past is a key to the future (6). Archaeological strata contain artifacts that record events and processes during millennia of human occupations of different soils. In many areas, contemporary use of soils is not greatly different from ancient use of soils. In other places, technology has changed a great deal, but always the soils in landscapes have a dominant influence upon land use patterns. Often, the archaeological record proves that ancient people abused their soils, and their civilizations were disrupted by the ecological and environmental consequences. In places, ancient populations were larger than modern populations.
Archaeological considerations give reason for modern man to ponder if he is using resources wisely and to seek explanations for the ancient population declines and shifts so that he might avoid a similar fate. Generally, the most important factors in a nation's continuing prosperity are not its conquests in war (1) but the nature of its husbandry of soils through centuries of use and occupation.
The Maya story
Extensive research on relations of soils to archaeology has been done in Maya areas of Central America. At Tikal in the Peten region of Guatemala, soils were described, sampled, and mapped at a scale …
Footnotes
Gerald W. Olson is an associate professor of soil survey interpretations in the Department of Agronomy (Soils) at Cornell University, Ithaca, New York 14853. This article is based on material from a new book, Soils and the Environment: A Guide to Soil Surveys and Their Applications.
- Copyright 1981 by the Soil and Water Conservation Society
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