Wetland environments were often chosen for the location of permanent settlements in prehistoric times. This could be for many reasons: use of local resources, easiness to erect timber houses, transport, or even defence. Extensive, wetland occupation (lake-dwellings in particular) began quite early (late 5^th Millennium BC) in the Circum-Alpine region of Europe, and, despite several short phases of abandonment, the phenomenon continued for over three millennia, coming to an end in the early Iron Age. In other parts of Europe (mainly northern Europe) however, wetland sites continued to be built until the Late Iron Age, and even in historical times. A comparative analysis of these two seemingly far, but indeed closely-connected areas (central and northern Europe) is therefore germane to comprehend culture-environmental discrepancies

The main objective of this project is to gain a better understanding of past wetland management in various parts of Europe, with a special emphasis placed upon the Alpine and the Baltic regions. This will not only shed light on people/wetlands interaction in prehistoric Europe, but it will give us the opportunity to plan more systematic protection schemes for this delicate environment (and its precious cultural heritage), which is currently under threat by many factors, in particular climate change. The project endorses multidisciplinary collaboration amongst European scholars from various topic-related disciplines (botany, geology, climatology), thus broadening new research perspectives within past as well as contemporary environmental issues.