International Conference, Leibniz Institute for the History and Culture of Eastern Europe (GWZO), 12–13 March 2024
The history of cities and rivers is inextricably linked. As suppliers of water and energy, transport and traffic routes or waste disposal method, waterways were often the starting point and an indispensable prerequisite for the development of urban communities. In recent years, historians have therefore been focusing more intensively on the relevance of rivers for pre-modern cities. This research has shown that the relationship between cities and rivers cannot be understood as a dichotomous opposition of nature and culture. Instead, both are symbiotically intertwined as socio-natural sites.
The conference draws on these considerations by addressing the opportunities and challenges arising from the symbiosis of river and pre-modern city. To provide new research impulses, floodplains will also be taken into consideration. Despite their frequently emphasized importance, they remain an important desideratum, especially from the perspective of urban history. In the context of this conference, floodplains can be understood as a fluvial anthroposphere, i.e. as spaces in which, due to their intensive fluvial dynamics, a special concentration of socio-natural processes takes place. This causes far-reaching changes in the environment as well as the emergence of special patterns of human behavior and subsequently fluvial cultures.
The conference approaches the relationship between cities and rivers as well as floodplains from a transregional, comparative and cross-epochal perspective. Case studies from Western and Eastern-Central Europe will be discussed, covering the time period from the Middle Ages to the epochal threshold around 1800. Where possible, cities situated upon smaller waterways will also be included to broaden the focus of research, which is usually centered on large river metropolises.
The conference takes place at the Leibniz Institute for the History and Culture of Eastern Europe (GWZO), Reichsstraße 4-6 (Entrance A), 04109 Leipzig.
If you would like to take part, please register by 26 February 2025 at flux(at)uni-leipzig.de.