By Miguel Gonzlez.

Just about
The western bank of river Lagan contain a wealth of historic and cultural significance. This
is clearly evident in the landscape, which has been moulded and changed over thousand of years of human activity. This project is looking to study the processes of the human construction of the landscape, examining their relationship with economic, social and cultural dynamics and characterizing their evolution through prehistory and history. From a more general perspective, it principally aims to discover the concept of space, and secondarily the concept of time and nature, which guide spatial human actions and underlie the materialization of the social being in spatial terms. The tool to develop this study is called Historical Landscape Survey (HLS), and HLS is a mean by which the landscape and analyses in order to understand that significance (need citation). The historical environment is a term used to embrace all the historic aspect of our environment, by they archaeological sites, historic landscapes, standing buildings, seminatural environments or historic land-uses such as industry, farming, defense, communications and even tourism. It is the environment created over thousands of years through the cultural and economic activities of the people who settled on the land. The historic environment is not just about the past, however, it is about the present and even the future. The Cultural Heritage is also an important educational resource and can even generate income and employment through tourism and improve the regeneration of our community. In the other hand of this project is to integrate a series of different approaches toward cultural heritage from disciplines that are not linked to the interpretation and management of heritage elements. The object of this strategy is cultural heritage itself as a social reality, in its different dimensions within a context marked by the post-industrial society and the transition toward a knowledge-based socio economy. Archaeology is a key tool for recording and analyzing the historic landscape. An HLS therefore seeks to use archaeological techniques of field recording and documentary research to trace the evolution of the landscape and identify significant features within. It is therefore possible to regard standing buildings and the uses of the land around it, as tell us of how the landscape was used by the people in the past. It also means that Archaeology knows no time restriction and is therefore as relevant to the study of 20 th century Industrial buildings or wartime defaces as it is to Bronze age barrows or Neolithic farms.

This characterization of the past landscapes is an important new way of managing changes in the historic landscape and the heritage itself, also it is a primary vehicle for achieving the goals and aspirations of the European Landscape Convention ( www.convention.coe.int/Treaty/en/Treaties/Html/176.htm) also known as the Florence Convention, that promotes the protection, management and planning of European Landscapes and organizes European co-operation on landscape issues.

But also, this project Roimhe is a cross-community archaeological project. This means archaeology by the people for the people, it is empowered by the reality that within a locality there will be many people interested and exited by the material evidence for the past, which lies beneath their streets, houses, gardens, workplaces and is scattered across fields and woods. This project want to give the local people, whatever their age, skill level, family and work obligations the chance to participate in real archaeology. This involves not just practical investigations -excavations, surveying, field walking and so on- but also doing detailed recording, identifying finds, developing specialist knowledge and carrying out documentary investigations. Most enjoyable of all, it involves working in a team to define research objectives in the first place, offer interpretations of findings and disseminate these to a wider audience through displays, workshops and a variety of publications.

LOVE DATING?
LOVE ARCHAEOLOGY

FACTS
Archaeological sites
90 80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0 Prehistory

194

Echr

Medieval

Post-medieval

Modern

Uncertain

Industrial heritage sites Defense heritage sites Scheduled areas

291

56 11

37 66

Historic Parks and Gardens Listed buildings

645
Heritage points

With over 400 Heritage points, the western side of the river Lagan of Belfast, is a very important accumulation of cultural landscape, from over 8,500 years ago and we continue changing it.

early settlers Prehistoric landscape

Turbulent times: Early Christian landscape

Medieval landscape

the birth of the city: Post-Medieval landscape

The growth of the city: Modern landscape

Unknow landscape: Uncertain sites

Industrial landscape

strategies
1.- Cultural Heritage Management 1.1.- Develop tools&protocols to help the authorities to keep and look after of the heritage Create the Map of risks of Cultural Heritage 1.2.- Develop a website with access of project public databases Explanation of the project Marketing Advertaising of news and events Social Networks 1.3.- Develop activities to promote the conservation of our Heritage Program of Interpretation of the Heritage: leafles and publications. 2.- Education 2.1 Workshops Meet the ancestors: experimental archaeology for children Adopt a monument in danger StreetScape Archaeological survival 2.2.- Training courses 2.2.1.- Teachers The Heritage like educational tool in the classroom 2.2.2.- General public How to survive in the prehistory: Experimental archaeology Rangers an guides of Cultural Heritage 3.- Economic 3.1.- Develop a touristic routebased in the Heritage Archaeological tour The linen tour: industrial heritage 3.2.- Develop Jobs&Business opportunities 4.- Social Create family events based in our Heritage Celebrate International Archaeological Days Exhibitions about Heritage Conferences and public lectures Develop a magazine about the project and Heritage in NI

Rath
5th - 9th century AD

enclosure
16th - 19th century AD

Megalithic monument
16th - 19th century AD

Roimhe is a new tool to manage our heritage and develop their full potential, educational, recreational, touristic and also econonomic.