Kevin Walsh

 The proposed project, Human-environment interactions in Mediterranean Mountains: A case study in characterising the Anthropocene, builds on research where I co-direct international multidisciplinary teams that combines humanities and natural sciences in mountain Archaeology and Historical Ecology. Recently, many scientists have accepted the notion of an Anthropocene – a period when environmental systems are dominated by human influences, or when human activity has a significant effect on the environment. One fundamental area of debate is when this period started [1-4]. We must accept that certain landscapes have been more susceptible to human influence than others. Mediterranean landscapes, and in particular, Mediterranean mountains, are some of the most sensitive environments globally – mountain landscapes are especially sensitive to both climate change and human activity. However, even where we can demonstrate that people and/or climate have caused environmental degradation, it is apparent that many mountain communities across the Mediterranean have developed resilient socio-economic strategies. These strategies have often restricted the extent to which some mountain landscapes have passed non-reversible “tipping points”; i.e. a point when an earth system is highly susceptible to degradation that can be caused by only a small change in that system.