LANDSCAPE ECOLOGY ASPECTS IN A TERRITORY CENTURIATED IN ROMAN TIMES

The research work is intended to verify some concepts of landscape ecology taking asa starting point recent investigations on territories that underwent centuriation in Roman times. The centuration technique was applied for a long time, covering large and well-documented space-time scales, that thus have an evolutive value. The fact that large areas with clear traces of centuration have remained for some millennia may lead us to believe that the environment is well balanced in those areas. Yet not all the sites where centuriation was applied have maintained its characteristic structure. To these premises we have applied the landscape ecology concepts of scale, hierarchy and metastability. Together with classical systematic investigations they can provide an exhaustive description of the condition of the environment. Once more the results highlight the importance of metastablility thresholds. From these it may be inferred that the practice of centuration could allow a high environmental fitness. The knowledge of ancient land-surveyors was not based on systematic observations in a scientific sense, but on the wide pragmatic casuistry of the various preceeding agricultural civilizations. The technological applications of those practices did not contrast with the ecological requirements of the areas subject to centuriation. Land management proved to be so good and apt to anthropic requirements, that afterwards man seldom needed further interventions.