La presencia histórica del fuego en el territorio

Abstract

Fire-territory interaction has not followed a linear evolution neither in space nor in time. For centuries, the use of fire as a tool for land management and the rural culture of fire implied a controlled fire regime, preventing disaster scenarios. On the other hand, fire frequency and burned area increased in historical periods of crisis andterritorial instability. Thus, both the fire regime and territorial dynamics have undergone major changes throughout history, namely pyrotransitions. The Complutense Research Group Forest Geography, Policy and Socio-economics has reconstructed the fire history in the Iberian Peninsula. Two pyrotransitions were identifiedthrough the documentary geo-historical sources, i.e. administrative documents, judicial and police sources, and printed press. A georeferenced database containing 6,588 records of pre-statistical fires starting in 1492 is the main outcome of this research beganin 2010. This historical fire records database is structured in a similar manner than the Spanish Forest Fires Statistics. These data provide information and explanations about the territorial and cultural basis of the current fire regime, by focusing on the structuralcauses of wildfires and stablishing links between the landscape character and dynamics on the one hand, and the ignition and propagation patterns on the other.