Abstract:

Recent regulatory decrees such as the “Testo Unico del Vino” (2016) and the Ministerial Decree n. 6899 of 2020 led to the official legitimation of “heroic vineyards” and “historical vineyards” as historical environmental heritage. For obtaining the latter recognition, the M.D. establishes a series of criteria, including the use of traditional farming methods and existence prior to 1960. As already noted, this legislation opens up new demands for geo-historical and environmental-archaeological research applied to the characterization and enhancement of the Italian’s rural landscape heritage. This paper discusses the potentialities and the limits of historical cartographies for the diachronic study of vineyard landscapes, also by cross-checking with the bio-stratigraphic evidence collected during the archaeological research. In this regard, two case studies are presented, located in Liguria and Trentino (Italy), which allow for the exploration of different documentary series (18th-20th century), due to the diversity of sources available for the territories of the different pre-unification states of the Peninsula. The historical cartography was collected and analyzed in series, according to the cartographic filtering method, to build a “biography” of the vineyard landscapes. In conclusion, the paper highlights the potential of geo-historical analysis and cartographic sources to provide information on the extent, forms of cultivation, and composition of historical vineyards, also in terms of applied historicalgeography. At the same time, the examination of the two case studies allows to bright to light theoretical and methodological clues for discussing the official categories currently employed.