environment briefly describes the surroundings in which we live. We can look at the environment historically in two ways. First, by identifying ways in which the environment has moulded or changed the course of human history. Towns have frequently developed where there were fords or bridges, and ports have grown or declined through the silting-up of themselves or their rivals. Wind and weather have frequently played a decisive role in battles or campaigns. William III in 1688 was assisted by the ‘protestant wind’ which kept James II's fleet in harbour while allowing the invaders to sail to Devon. The presence of bogs by the river Forth was a vital element in the victory of the Scots over the English at Bannockburn in 1314.

Secondly, we may consider the effects of human action on the environment itself. From the earliest prehistoric slash-and-burn agriculture to the development of genetically engineered crops, the natural environment of Britain has been modified by its inhabitants. Perhaps the most notable of changes has been the removal of the blanket of trees which once covered virtually all of the British Isles. Clearance for fields, firewood, and building materials had already reduced cover to 15 per cent of England's land by the time of Domesday Book. By the 16th cent. a timber shortage was developing that encouraged the use of coal, which itself changed the appearance of vast tracts of countryside.

The industrial revolution and the subsequent growth of large towns introduced extensive air pollution and caused acute problems of water supply and sanitation. It was only with legislation such as the Alkali Works Act of 1863 that substantial amelioration of bad conditions was effected. Even so, sooty buildings, smoky chimneys, dead rivers, and grimy canals soon became immortalized in literature set in the industrial north and gave impetus to the Romantic appreciation of ‘natural’ landscape, and to the development of national cultures, linked to an ideal of rural ‘pureness’. Conservation societies were founded from mid-19th cent. onwards.

Calls for conservation accelerated as first railways, then roads, and the inexorable spread of towns, changed the face of the land. Concern has increased about the pollution of rivers and oceans as a result of the indiscriminate dumping of waste. The industrialization of agriculture after the Second World War, with its attendant use of chemicals and uprooting of hedgerows, has destroyed the habitat of many familiar plants and animal species. Many historic town centres have been blighted by insensitive redevelopment, often to accommodate the ever-growing number of cars and lorries. The approaches to most towns now look the same, with the supermarket, the large car park, and the congested roundabout. Sometimes a spectacular disaster has awakened the public conscience. Up to 4,000 people died in the London smog of December 1952: 116 small children were killed in October 1966 at Aberfan when a slag heap, created by coal waste, slipped down a hillside and buried their school. From the 1960s membership of older conservation groups mushroomed, and new and more radical groups, such as the Friends of the Earth, were founded. The Green Party, established to campaign specifically on environmental issues, had more success in persuading the other main parties to steal its clothes than in winning electoral support. In cleaning up rivers and reopening canals, much progress has been made: in creeping urbanization it is doubtful whether we have much improved on the 1930s which saw miles of ribbon-development along the new ‘arterial’ roads.

Christopher N. Lanigan