The brown gold: a reappraisal of medieval peat marshes in Northern Flanders (Belgium)

Although the importance of peat as energy supplier in the medieval and early modern North Sea Area is well known, the location, extent and nature of the peat-producing areas—peat marshes or mires—remains amongst the major problems in the landscape history of the coastal wetlands. This is especially true for areas like Northern Flanders, where peat marshes have since completely disappeared. This article reconsiders the ‘peat debate’ between geoscientists, who rely on ‘positive’ soil evidence, and historians, who accept ‘circumstantial’ historical data so as to reconstruct former peat marshes. B... Mehr ...