Between the Atlantic and the Mediterranean: fisheries and salt communities at the turn of the 18th century / late 1700s to early 1800s

• Type: Chapter or Part of a Book
• Date: 2010

Authors

Inês Amorim (Author) FLUP

Book

Title: Pesci, barche, pescatori nell'area mediterranea tra medioevo ed età contemporanea

1º Edition

Pages: 17-36

Publisher: Universitat de Salerno

Scientific classification

FOS: Humanities > History and Archaeology

CORDIS: Humanities > History ; Natural sciences > Environmental science > Natural resources management

Other information

Abstract (EN): At the turn of the 18th century, a particular combination of circumstances brought about significant changes in the exploration of coastal resources and boosted economic and scientific interest in the quality and nature of fisheries and salt. These changes can be explained by different yet confluent reasons, as we will show: the growth of the Portuguese population and a consequent rise in the levels of consumption, as well as a decline in the supply of English codfish that began in the mid-18th century. As a result, scarcity of fish and derivatives led to the development of a programme of scientific coastal expeditions designed by naturalists (1789 to 1815), aimed at describing resources, assessing the state of the sector in the wake of government reforms and studies on fish salting processes and the quality of Portuguese salt. Based on those records, both published and unpublished, it is our purpose to contribute to the identification of communities whose work was closely linked to fisheries and salt production in the 18th century, with a view to ‘mapping’ an Atlantic/Mediterranean Atlas of a “biologic complex”. We have divided this paper into four levels of analysis: 1. Environment, fisheries and salt - the specificity of the Portuguese coast; 2. The records (or lack of sources) on fishermen and salt workers’ communities; 3. Quantifying Portuguese Fishery and Salt communities; 4. The need for a fishery research programme

Language: English

Type (Professor's evaluation): Scientific