Responses to the Cronon Prompts

 

In looking at W. Cronon, M. Bloch, and W. Prescott it is clear that each mentions the land with a different purpose.  Cronon in Changes in the Land (1983) is eager to describe ecological changes, and discuss how peoples have interacted with the environment.  Since people are a part of nature, land usage is central to his analysis.  Bloch explores, albeit briefly and superficially, how nature affects medieval persons in Feudal Society (1961, English translation).  He ventures to say, "The men of the two feudal ages were close to nature - much closer than we are; and nature as they knew it was much less tamed and softened than we see it today." (72)  Despite early dependence on hunting and gathering, he is more keen on noting the adverse effects of light depravation, severity of the cold, and early mortality.  Prescott, in History of the Conquest of Mexico (1843), true to his literary sensibilities, draws a sweeping picture of the geography, topography, and climate of Mexico.  Apart from the fruits of the land, e.g. maize, wheat, and aloe, his reference to agriculture is to mark the "mechanical art[s]" of civilization. (19)  His concern is not for land usage as it is for describing early military encounters and politics. 

Bloch and Prescott attend to different historical purposes than Cronon.  In History of the Conquest, military and political events, with the hero Hernán Cortés (whom Prescott names Hernando), comprise the narrative substance.  In Feudal Society, social interactions are the center of feudalism, and although land usage is acknowledged, its relation to the medieval person is a background reality.  Prescott and Bloch do not share the same concerns as Cronon.  Nevertheless, Bloch would be the most sympathetic to studying ecological surroundings and peoples.  Interestingly, land usage could serve to better understand the Aztecs and Spaniards as it did in demonstrating the relations between Indians and colonists in Changes in the Land.    

The late 1970s and 1980s is when early works began to emerge, as Cronon points out. (172)  Implicitly and otherwise, topographers, geographers, ecologists, geologists, palaeontologists, and others, have dealt with environmental history.  While perhaps not looking at the direct sequence of past events between people and nature, they as scientists examine natural changes.