Routes of culture: enhancement and management of large scale heritage sites. Via Appia - Roman Consular street - and Grand Canal of China.

Project leaders

Heleni Porfyriou, Bing Yu

Agreement

CINA - CACH - Chinese Academy of Cultural Heritage

Call

CNR/CACH 2016-2018

Department

Social sciences and humanities, cultural heritage

Thematic area

Social sciences and humanities, cultural heritage

Status of the project

New

Research proposal

Proposta di ricerca:
Large scale heritage sites are a very challenging subject, particularly in a globalized society like ours, and thus necessitate an integrated and multi-disciplinary approach. This is even more true when we refer to territorial systems such as cultural routes. In this context, heritage sites are shaped by complex interactions between the present and the past, culture and nature, built and intangible assets and so on. In fact, along the system of the principal ancient routes of communication, both through water and earth, are still visible the traces of settlements, infrastructures, monuments; all heritage assets of a rich and stratified past and potential resources for sustaining development opportunities for today, at a territorial scale. The interpretation, conservation, enhancement and management of those complex heritage systems, characterized by an extraordinary density of historic stratifications and cultural values, as well as by the vitality of human present activities, produce multiple effects both on a tangible (socioeconomic and territorial) and intangible level (sense of identity, local culture). The elaboration therefore of any intervention strategies should be based on a better knowledge of the heritage in itself and on the evaluation of its regulatory systems, as well as its management policies, operations and impacts referred to the site in itself and to its broader territorial context. This proposal, based on a comparative research approach between the Grand Canal in China and the ancient roman consular street of Appia (constituted as a park in 1988, comprising only the first 16 kilometres of the regina viarium) aims to identify valorisation tools and guiding lines for an integrated management of these sites (and of their related components) expected to enforce local sustainable development goals. 1. The Grand Canal is a unique media, centred on water, between man and nature and provides an ideal platform on which the heritage chain - archaeological work, research and evaluation, planning and policy-making, preservation and intervention, management and monitoring of water resources, interpretation and utilization, community involvement and public service, ecological conservation and social sustainability - leaves its multiple traces, thus offering a challenging management research topic. The case of the Grand Canal is even more interesting as it has just been listed as UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2014. It thus offers the possibility to follow not only how the management plan was prepared before the nomination but also how it is implemented afterwards. Less effort has been made in the past on the follow-up tracking, so a feasible framework needs to be worked out in terms of methodology and technology in data collection and analysis considering the complexity of the heritage chain involved. With the help of systematic tracking and evaluation of the implementation of the management plan, a better understanding of many issues would be gained, such as, which regulations are relevant,to which extent visitors enjoy the site, which are the designation benefit for the welfare of local communities. In addition to the overall understanding of the protection and management of the Grand Canal the project will focus on the case study of the city of Huai'an thus comparing state and city level measures and policies on heritage management.
2. The "Via Appia", considered a "regina viarium" (the queen of streets), was one of the earliest and strategically most important Roman roads of ancient Rome. It connected Rome to Brindisi in southeast Italy, opening the Italian peninsula to the East, thus offering to Rome direct access to all trade routes with Greece, Egypt and the Orient and a privileged conduit for military expeditions. The wealth of trade favoured the emergence of a variety of activities (productive, economic, residential, etc.) also along the street. This flourishing of settlements and structures was also due to the presence of a series of aqueducts (with long stretches developing underground), as the Aqua Claudia, the Anio Novus, the Aqua Marcia, bringing water to Rome and to the villas spread all over the roman countryside. The idea for a large scale archaeological park starting from the center of Rome and reaching out to the countryside, up to the Alban Hills, dates back to the Napoleonic period. However, only in 1988, the "Appia Antica Regional Park", was constituted by Lazio Region, after tens of petitions and projects struggling for the defence of the Appia Antica and its monuments. The park has a surface of about 3.400 hectares and comprises only 16 km of the Antique Appian street, while nowadays more than 2.500 illegal buildings are calculated within its boundaries. The research will focus on the identification of pilot cases in the context of these large scale heritage sites, on two major aspects: management and enhancement. The linear structure of both Chinese and Italian case studies and their similar use as routes of communication suggest to explore initially the cultural routes approach used in recent years, such as that of Via Francigena in Italy, http://www.viefrancigene.org; of Via Egnatia in a European scale, http://www.viaegnatiafoundation.eu/, and of the Digital Silk road in a global Eurasian level, http://dsr.nii.ac.jp/index.html.en., in order to identify the best practices. In parallel, an analysis of the most significant economic components characterizing the case studies and connected to the cultural values, as well as of the ongoing management projects, will be carried out, in order to possibly identify the main factors that represent a source of social and economic benefit for the living communities and the different groups of concerned stakeholders. In this sense, a particular focus will be given to water, its important role along both the two communication routes, also as regards management and conservation issues.

Research goals

In this context, the major research themes and aims of the proposal will regard: 1) a comparative research between the two countries on the management planning and policies of the relative case studies with the aim to identify those governance models and operative instruments (such as territorial networking, interdisciplinary cooperation, cultural district economic organization systems, etc.) for approaching heritage as a real resource to support local development and foster community empowerment; 2) an investigation on the enhancement methodologies and approaches used by both countries and on the identification of appropriate ICT tools aiming to support integrated management solutions; 3) a research on the legislative and regulatory tools utilised by both countries in order to safeguard, discipline, conserve and manage such complex heritage sites. The Italian team will focus in particular on the still missing legislation for the constitution of "archaeological parks", highlighting its importance for the proper and effective management of large scale archaeological sites. At the same time, the issue of heritage conservation, in terms of present conditions of stability of the ancient works, and/or their interaction with present built-up areas (buildings, infrastructures, etc.) will also be taken into account at selected sites.

Last update: 25/04/2024