Heritage landscapes in Évora surroundings: a GIS approach

Abstract

Évora (the Lusitanian Ebora), the most important town in Alentejo province (Southern Portugal) is involved by a cultural landscape where not only archeological sites and old built structures (walls, roads, bridges houses, etc.) of several epochs are present, but also old parcel networks and specific agro forestry pastoral systems, the montados, exist. In front of a so big quantity of data, the authors have selected four main heritage valuated landscapes: - The holm-oak, cork-oak, or mixed montados landscapes. - The old Augustan roman cadastral networks; - The old Late Empire roman cadastral networks; - The old Medieval ground parcels network; Our first theme is related with holm and cork oak montados, traditional agro forestry pastoral systems classified by law. Beyond the productive function, these cultural landscapes present high biological, scenic and recreational value. In the area several different types with different levels of conservation are present. Other kind of heritage landscapes were also studied: two roman cadastral network involving Ebora (the roman Évora), of different periods and with different orientations, and a medieval parcels network located in the close surroundings of the city. An essay of heritage valuation of those heritage landscapes was also done. Firstly the selection of suitable criteria and related weighting coefficients was established in the sequence of debates with experts. Then the application of a linear combination permitted to estimate heritage value. GIS tools were very useful to the integration of such spatial themes and their analysis. It utilization permitted to determine the zonation of the most valuable heritage landscape areas around Évora. Otherwise the use of GIS database allowed the overlaying of the four heritage landscapes types, as well as the calculation of the networks limits density, permitting to define the most interesting areas to be preserved in land planning projects.