Geochemical fingerprint of agricultural liming as a regular management practice in Modern-period Basque farming

Abstract

The Modern period in Europe is marked by the introduction of deep agricultural changes. In the Basque Country (northern Spain), the implantation of an intensive crop rotation was made possible by the expansion of agricultural liming, although the extent and implications of this practice have not been previously explored in depth. The present paper proposes a multidisciplinary approach to this question, based on the combined analysis of archival sources, toponymy, visual prospection focused on the presence of limekilns, and agricultural soil coring in four local contexts of the Atlantic Basque Country. The results show, for the first time, evidence of concurrent and widespread liming in this territory at the edge of the 18th century, with strong implications for the model of agricultural management in the communities involved. The spreading of mineral fertilisation reflects an intensification in the forms of agricultural management, in the framework of a new relationship between land and labour that emerged after the introduction of American crops. Continuous liming for more than 200 years exerted a deep impact in the analysed soils, with interesting socio-economic and ecological implications that are representative of the potential short-term effects that changing relationship between humans and their socio-ecological environment may produce in agricultural soils.