Abstract Cultural heritage objects can only be understood, if the surrounding landscape is taken
under consideration, too. In certain cases, the landscape even constitutes the cultural object itself.
UNESCO has considered this fact by adding the category of 'Cultural Landscapes' to the sites eligible for
the World Heritage List. In this paper, methods to survey, document and visualize landscapes are
discussed. Especially, with new imaging opportunities, such as satellite images with 1 meter resolution,
landscapes can be mapped economically. Results, such as maps, perspectives, animations and
geographic information systems can help to present the landscapes to those who cannot visit its location
and are a powerful means for studying, monitoring and managing landscapes of cultural relevance.
Landscapes
Natural Features, Formations and Sites
UNESCO (1972) uses the term 'Natural Heritage' for physical, biological, geological and physiographical
features, formations and sites of outstanding value from an aesthetic or scientific point of view. Far more
than 100 natural heritage sites are designated by UNESCO as World Heritage and many others are
receiving various degrees of protection under state or local legislation. From a conservationist's point of
view, it would be desirable to keep human interference completely away from these areas. Since, on the
other hand, many visitors are attracted, management guidelines have to be prepared and enforced and a
monitoring process is needed to detect and prevent unwanted changes. Nevertheless, natural features,
formations and sites are subject to changes caused by nature itself (UNESCO Operational Guidelines
specifically mention on-going geological processes and on-going ecological and biological processes)
and it would be a misinterpretation of conservation to keep these natural processes away from the
objects.
Cultural Heritage Objects and Landscape
Meanwhile, more than 600 objects of 'Cultural Heritage' are designated by UNESCO as World Heritage
sites. This is just a choice selection of a heritage comprising innumerable single monuments, groups of
buildings or historical and archaeological sites of outstanding value for historical, artistic or scientific
reasons. Although cultural objects are man-made, UNESCO in its Convention mentions landscape in this
context, too ("buildings because of their ... place in the landscape", "combined works of nature and
man").
In fact, no cultural heritage object can be understood without taking the surrounding landscape into
account. Human dwellings have to use places in the landscape where an optimal protection from natural
forces (weather, flooding) and enemy attacks is possible, and the supply of essentials (food, water,
kindling) is assured as well. Special topographic features are chosen in all religions as places of worship
or as sites for the location of divine buildings. Sovereigns chose special places to erect their palaces and
mausoleums and often changed the surrounding topography, too. Cities developed along trade roads or
close to bridges and fords. And even when a small arrow tip is found somewhere in the fields it should be
studied why it was lost here and not somewhere else in the landscape.
The location of all those objects in a landscape was a result of practical or metaphysical considerations
and rules. Thus, it is not sufficient to examine and document the object itself. Far more often than
presently done, the landscape surrounding a cultural heritage object should be considered, studied and
documented, too. If the present topography is surveyed, mapped and visualized, historic evidence may
be used to reconstruct landscape development from ancient to present times. At the same time,
conservational hazards originating from the present topography (erosion, slides, flooding) or landuse
(agriculture, industry, traffic) can be foreseen and possibly prevented.
Cultural Landscapes
There are cases where natural and cultural criteria of a landscape cannot be separated. The value of
such landscapes, being both, of natural and cultural significance, was hard to define with the 1972
UNESCO Convention. This is why UNESCO revised it in 1992 and adopted three categories of ’Cultural
Landscapes’ (Roessler, 2000):
Landscapes Intentionally Designed and Created by Man. This embraces garden and parkland
landscapes constructed for aesthetic reasons. Often, but not always, buildings and ensembles are part of
those landscapes.
Organically Evolved Landscapes originate from an initial imperative (social, economic, administrative,
religious) and have developed their present form in an evolutionary process in close interdependence
with the natural environment. This evolutionary process may have come to an end in the past (’relict’ or
’fossil landscape’) or it is still continuing (’continuing landscape’). Where a relict landscape needs
conservational methods to preserve the site, a continuing landscape needs management plans and
measures to allow evolution without destroying its outstanding value.
Associative Cultural Landscapes may show no man-made evidence at all (thus, from a materialistic
point of view just being natural landscapes), but powerful religious, artistic or cultural associations of the
natural element attach special importance to those landscapes.
Landscape Documentation
Virtual Landscapes
A landscape can only be experienced in all aspects when visited at its original location. Obviously, no
virtual landscape can match reality. It should be noted, however, that not everybody is physically or
financially able to visit any landscape of interest. Many landscapes can only be reached after a strenuous
journey. Other places are located within areas of war or turmoil and - unfortunately - one has to be
prepared that this may happen to places that have been safe so far, too. In these cases, a virtual trip
through a digitally created landscape can be the only way to explore an area.
A person, moving on the surface of a landscape, can overlook only a very limited part of this landscape.
Many impressive landscapes (e.g. a river winding through a mountain range) can only be observed in
total from locations far above the ground. Even when such viewpoints can be reached by airborne
vehicles, the vision will be limited by the vehicle’s structures as well as atmospheric effects. Virtual
landscapes do not impose any limits to the observer in this respect because any observation point can
be reached to have a look at the scene and virtual trips through and around the place at a course of
one’s own choice can be undertaken. These are reasons why a virtual representation is of much more
importance for the documentation of landscapes as compared to virtual images of other objects of
cultural heritage.
