Towards an environmental history of the Bowmont Valley and the northern Cheviot Hills

ABSTRACT

The many and complex landscape changes that have occurred in the northern Cheviot Hills in the last c. 1000years are reviewed. The approach taken is to examine this period using, predominantly, palaeoenvironmental techniques, and the intention is to indicate the power of such reconstructions when allied to a secure and precise timescale. Palaeoenvironmental analyses identify important landscape changes not generally detected from documentary or archaeological data. The discussion here will address issues relating to medieval sheep-ranching, to the impacts on landscapes and society of the ‘Little Ice Age’, and the loss of biodiversity introduced by intensive sheep-grazing in the last c. 250 years.

KEYWORDS:

• Cheviot Hills
• uplands
• medieval & post-medieval
• palynology
• fluvial geomorphology
• climate change