Chapter VI - The swamps and narrow roads – the landscape

Summary

The research on the early modern landscape is a journey into the unknown, where the objects which still exist today are surrounded by some uncertain, vanishing entities. The examination of this theme can be valuable not only for better understanding of the theatre of military operations but also for the general comprehension of the impact of the environmental circumstances on human life. A good example of such observations is the remark made by Michael Roberts, who noted that despite the large size of the sixteenth-century Swedish winter, sleigh travel was faster and easier than travelling in the summer – which not necessarily correspond to our logical but stereotypical beliefs on travelling in the wintertime. In many aspects the environment and landscape of Northern, Central and Eastern Europe has not changed as dramatically as this of Western Europe, and some places look almost the same as in the seventeenth century. The vast majority of rivers in Poland, Norway or Estonia has not been regulated. In Poland, the regulatory process is only now gaining momentum, despite the protests of environmentalists and the European Union bans. Some other features of the landscape made by humans many centuries ago have not changed either – we can name here strip fields characteristic of Southern Poland or point to a still large number of storks, the best bio-indicators demonstrating clearly the state of pollution. However, a lot was also altered or “modernized” and in particular the great action of drainage of marshlands and swamps in the second half of the twentieth century transformed some areas completely. Most likely the Biebrza Marshes, today the Polish National Park, with its rich wildlife habitats, and a paradise of wetland birds, can give us an idea of the conditions that prevailed in this part of Europe several hundred years ago.

Some places seem unchanged since the Second Northern War, as if abandoned by soldiers only a while ago.