Historical ecology is based on the recognition that humans are not only capable of modifying their environments, but that all environments on earth have already been directly or indirectly modified. This Handbook provides examples of how people interact with their environments and presents outlines of the methods used to understand these changes.

Daryl Stump and Christian Isendahl.: Introduction: The Construction of the Present through the Reconstruction of the Past. Part 1: Potential and Pitfalls IntroductionChristian Isendahl and Daryl Stump: 1: Carole Crumley: New Paths into the Anthropocene: Applying Historical Ecologies to the Human Future 2: Paul Minnis: Thinking Like an Archaeologist and Thinking Like an Engineer: A Utilitarian-Perspective Archaeology 3: William E. Doolittle: Expedience, Impermanence, and Unplanned Obsolescence: The Coming-About of Agricultural Features and Landscapes 4: Paul J. Lane: Just How Long Does 'Long-Term' Have to Be? Matters of Temporal Scale as Impediments to Interdisciplinary Understanding in Historical Ecology 5: Anneli Ekblom: Archaeology, Historical Sciences, and Environmental Conservation 6: Manuel Arroyo-Kalin: Landscaping, Landscape Legacies, and Landesque Capital in Pre-Columbian Amazonia 7: Karl Butzer: Integrating Geoarchaeology with Archaeology for Interdisciplinary Understanding of Societal-Environmental Relations Part 2: Approaches and Applications IntroductionDaryl Stump and Christian Isendahl: 8: Daryl Stump: Digging for Indigenous Knowledge: 'Reverse Engineering' and Stratigraphic Sequencing as a Potential Archaeological Contribution to Sustainability Assessments 9: Anabel Ford and Keith C. Clarke: Linking the Past and Present of the Ancient Maya: Lowland Land Use, Population Distribution, and Density in the Late Classic Period 10: R. Lee Lyman: Paleozoology Is Valuable to Conservation Biology 11: Ashley Coutu: Historic Molecules Connect the Past to Modern Conservation 12: Megan Hicks, Árni Einarsson, Kesara Anamthawat-Jónsson, Ágústa Edwald, Ægir Thór Thórsson, and Thomas H. McGovern: Community and Conservation: Documenting Millennial Scale Sustainable Resource Use at Lake Mývatn, Iceland 13: Federica Sulas: Soils, Plants, and Texts: An Archaeologist's Toolbox 14: Charles French: Grappling with Interpreting and Testing People-Landscape Dynamics 15: C. Michael Barton: From Narratives to Algorithms: Extending Archaeological Explanation beyond Archaeology 16: Scott Heckbert, Christian Isendahl, Joel D. Gunn, Simon Brewer, Vernon L. Scarborough, Arlen F. Chase, Diane Z. Chase, Robert Costanza, Nicholas P. Dunning, Timothy Beach, Sheryl Luzzadder-Beach, David Lentz, and Paul Sinclair: Growing the Ancient Maya Social-Ecological System from the Bottom Up 17: Karl-Johan Lindholm: Wells, Land, and History: Archaeology and Rural Development in Southern Africa 18: Camilla Årlin, Lowe Börjeson, and Wilhelm Östberg: Participatory Checking and the Temporality of Landscapes: Increasing Trust and Relevance in Qualitative Research 19: William Balée and Justin Nolan: Freelisting as a Tool for Assessing Cognitive Realities of Landscape Transformation: A Case Study from Amazonia Part 3: Reviving Past Technologies IntroductionDaryl Stump and Christian Isendahl: 20: Matthew Spriggs: A 1980 Attempt at Reviving Ancient Irrigation Practices in the Pacific: Rationale, Failure, and Success 21: Lorenzo Caponetti: The Invisible Landscape: The Etruscan Cuniculi of Tuscania as a Determinant of Present-Day Landscape and a Valuable Tool for Sustainable Water Management 22: Ann Kendall and David Drew: The Rehabilitation of Pre-Hispanic Agricultural Infrastructure to Support Rural Develoment in the Peruvian Andes: The Work of the Cusichaca Trust 23: Jago Cooper and Lindsay Duncan: Applied Archaeology in the Americas: Evaluating Archaeological Solutions to the Impacts of Global Environmental Change 24: Alexander Herrera: Indigenous Technologies, Archaeology, and Rural Development in the Andes: Three Decades of Trials in Bolivia, Ecuador, and Peru Part 4: Bridging the Past and Present IntroductionChristian Isendahl and Daryl Stump: 25: Michael E. Smith: Quality of Life and Prosperity in Ancient Households and Communities 26: Christian Isendahl, Vernon L. Scarborough, Joel D. Gunn, Nicholas P. Dunning, Scott L. Fedick, Gyles Iannone, and Lisa J. Lucero: Applied Perspectives on Pre-Columbian Maya Water Management Systems: What are the Insights for Water Security? 27: Paul Sinclair, Christian Isendahl, and Stephan Barthel: Beyond Rhetoric: Towards a Framework for an Applied Historical Ecology of Urban Planning 28: E. Christian Wells: Culture, Power, History: Implications for Understanding Global Environmental Change 29: Joseph A. Tainter and T. F. H. Allen: Energy Gain and the Evolution of Organization 30: Christian Isendahl and Daryl Stump: Conclusion: Anthropocentric Historical Ecology, Applied Archaeology, and the Future of a Useable Past

Provides a comprehensive overview of the topic Presents methodological reviews alongside case-studies Multidisciplinary in appeal, demonstrating the value of interdisciplinary research Appraises methodological strengths and weaknesses and aids future project design

Christian Isendahl is Senior Lecturer in Archaeology at the Department of Historical Studies, University of Gothenburg, Sweden. He is interested in issues of long-term sustainability and resilience, and applies a historical ecological lens to study urbanism, farming systems, water management, and socio-political organization in the past, particularly in the Maya Lowlands, the Central Andes, and the Amazon Basin. He has a strong interest in exploring, detailing, and discussing how archaeological research can generate knowledge about the past, and about long-term processes that provide practical insights for addressing contemporary challenges. Daryl Stump has worked as an archaeologist for over 25 years, and has particular research interests in the archaeology of agricultural systems, the later archaeology of East Africa, and in the role of long-term data in assessing the function and sustainability of farming practices. He currently heads the 'Archaeology of Agricultural Resilience in Eastern Africa' project (AAREA), funded by the European Research Council, which is examining the long-term sustainability of two East African agricultural systems (Engaruka in Tanzania and Konso in Ethiopia) through a combination of archaeological, geoarchaeological, archaeobotanical, and modelling techniques.

Provides a comprehensive overview of the topic Presents methodological reviews alongside case-studies Multidisciplinary in appeal, demonstrating the value of interdisciplinary research Appraises methodological strengths and weaknesses and aids future project design