ICOMOS Netherlands, in collaboration with scholars from the LeidenDelftErasmus Centre for Global Heritage and Development (CHGD) has published a new and important work presenting multidisciplinary research that connects water to heritage.
Through 21 chapters, it explores landscapes, cities, engineering structures and buildings from around the world. It describes how people have actively shaped the course, form and function of water for human settlement and the development of civilizations, establishing socioeconomic structures, policies and cultures; a rich world of narratives, laws and practices; and an extensive network of infrastructure, buildings and urban form.
Today, the many complex systems of the past are necessarily the basis for new systems that both preserve the past and manage water today: policy makers and designers can work together to recognize and build on the traditional knowledge and skills that old structure embody.
Check out the article on the publication at ICOMOS.