L’art du charbonnier: Contributions ethno-botanique et géographico-historique à l’étude des paysages métallurgiques d’après l’anthracoanalyse des charbonnières

Abstract

Charcoal-making is nowadays an every day process. However, it used to be the task of workers who for centuries exercised a slezeable pressure on forest vegetation and therefore determined the metallurgical activities. The traces of charcoalkilns which used to be present in scores of usual location definitely prove the action of man on the forest in a mountain environnement. But the study of coal fragments on those sites directly linked to a localized exploitation of wood remains preoccupying. An attempt at defining the various steps, techniques and processes used by charcoal-makers leads to various Interpretations and assumptions. They belong to an approach that is necessarily an ethnological, botanical, geographical and historical one. Such an approach enable us to avoid a certain number of ambiguities arising when attempting an in-depth study of coal fragments in charcoalkilns - a new method used to determine the historical dynamics of metallurgical forest sites. © 1992 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC.