Chapter 4

Slovenian Terraced Landscapes

Lučka Ažman Momirski

Abstract This review of Slovenian terraced landscapes presents some archaeological details, a detailed survey of published research on terraced landscapes, and the state of terraced landscapes in Slovenia. The study concludes with the inclusion of terraced landscapes in spatial planning and in protected cultural landscapes. Slovenia has hilly terrain that is not favorable for dense settlement. Exceptional archaeological findings on Mount Donatus (Donačka Gora) confirm that people already transformed slopes and settled on terraced platforms during the transition between the Bronze and Iron Ages. There have been two peak periods of publishing about Slovenia’s terraced landscapes: the first one in 2007 and 2008 and the second one in 2015 and 2016. Terraced areas can be found in more than 90% of Slovenia’s municipalities, but the presence of terraced landscapes in the municipalities is not uniform. Various types of terraces exist in Slovenia, and they can be defined according to the use or function of the terrace slope and terrace platform, the form of the terrace slope and terrace platform, and the construction of the terrace slope. Grassed terrace slopes are much more common in the Slovenian cultural landscape than dry stone wall construction, and they can be found in all Slovenian regions. Slovenian spatial planning has not recognized terraced regions as a landscape system sui generis and needs to adopt a procedure enabling institutions at the national and local levels to acknowledge their existence. In some cases, terraced landscapes are protected as a part of cultural landscapes and are recognized as cultural heritage sites.

4.1Introduction

Slovenia has exceptionally diverse landscapes within its small territory of 20,273 km2, which is inhabited by 2,063,371 people. The country does not have a terrain favorable for dense settlement, and the population density of Slovenia is

L. Ažman Momirski (&)

Faculty of Architecture, University of Ljubljana, Zoisova 12, 1000 Ljubljana, Slovenia e-mail: [e-mail]

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M. Varotto et al. (eds.), World Terraced Landscapes: History, Environment, Quality of Life, Environmental History 9, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-96815-5_4

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101.8 inhabitants/km2. Urban areas in Slovenia cover less than five percent of its land. The present settlement structure is also a result of implementing a polycentric urban system, the main goal of long-term spatial planning in Slovenia, promoted by a two-tiered structured network of centers of national and regional importance, to which the network of other centers connects based on considering the proper division of functions and interconnection of transport links (OdSPRS 2004). The capital, Ljubljana, is the only Slovenian city with a population over 100,000 (Republika Slovenija Statistični urad 2016). Slovenia’s wealth of diversity also results from the fact that the country lies at the intersection of four major European regions (the Alpine, Pannonian, Dinaric, and Mediterranean regions) and four different cultural spaces (German, Romance, Hungarian, and Slavic; Perko 1998a, b). This variety and the transitional nature of Slovenia’s regions constitute its main geographic characteristic and are important elements of its identity.

The major part of Slovenian territory is wooded (about three-fifths of the territory), and the rest is cultural landscape (over one-third of the territory). The plains, fields, basins, and valleys have slope inclinations between 0° and 2°, which accounts for 14.3% of the country’s territory (Perko 2001). The rest of the territory has a hilly configuration that required the people that settled it—who were more aware of their direct dependence on nature in the past and had to adapt to it—to grow their crops on the sides of hills or mountains by planting on graduated level areas built into the slope.

Farmers were particularly careful to retain and maintain their fertile soil (Ažman Momirski and Radikon 2008). Terraces maximized arable land in variable terrains and for various crops, reducing soil erosion and water loss at the same time. These terraces made it possible to create appropriate growing conditions for cultivating fruit trees and grapevines and to produce high-quality crops.

There is some archaeological evidence for the creation of terraced areas in Slovenia. Hillside terraces carved into rock are an exceptional archaeological discovery on the steep slope of Mount Donatus (Donačka Gora) at an elevation of 750 m in the Municipality of Rogatec. A study published in the early 1990s states that the archaeological site consists of terraces that were formed when collecting stone for querns (Ciglenečki 1992). After computer conversion of Lidar data for the terrain in 2015, archaeologists confirmed the existence of terraces that were clearly manmade. An archaeological field survey was conducted at the site in the fall of 2016. Remains of settlements from the transition of the Copper Age to the Iron Age (approximately when civilization was flourishing in the New Kingdom of Egypt, about 2800 years ago) were found on terraces south of the steep slope; these terraces enjoy excellent natural protection by cliffs on all sides. Houses and shacks stood on some terraces, and there were probably gardens and barns on other terraces. The terraces were about five meters wide and twenty or more meters long. Even after the Bronze Age, the terraces were occasionally in use (as is evident from pottery found at the site) in Late Antiquity and possibly in the Early Middle Ages (Odar 2016).

Other evidence that people were already building platforms and terraces reinforced with stone walls in pre-Roman times to erect houses on slopes has been

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found in Croatian Istria, south of the Slovenian border. Many prehistoric hillforts with fortified settlements at strategic locations from the Bronze Age and Iron Age in Istria are located there (Likar 2017). At the beginning of the second millennium BC, around 1800 BC, a newly settled community began extensive work to reshape the peak of the hill at the Monkodonja hillfort near Rovinj (Ivetić 2009). The site is laid out in oval concentric plateaus, the smallest one being the highest. The wider and more extended the platform, the lower it is. The material remains found in situ are evidence that the inhabitants were already able to build dry stone walls and earthen terraces for the village foundations (houses, platforms, and communication routes) and enclosure walls (Likar 2017). Research also indicates that people were compelled to build terraces for agricultural production in order to produce a suf- ficient quantity of food for a relatively large population living in the hilly Istrian environment. Studies of the finds at hillforts in Istria have shifted the boundary of features that until recently were ascribed to the Romans: Grape seeds, which were found during the last excavations at the Monkodonja hillfort in 1997, indicate that grapevines were already present before the arrival of the Romans (Ivetić 2009).

4.2Terraced Landscape Research in Slovenia

The partnership between University of Ljubljana’s Faculty of Architecture and the ALPTER project led to a decisive turning point in research on terraced landscapes in Slovenia. The ALPTER project (The Terraced Landscapes of the Alpine Arc, 2005–2008) reviewed the degradation of agricultural terraces caused by agricultural abandonment in the Alps and the possibilities for rehabilitating these terraced spaces (ALPTER 2015a, b). At least, 18 articles were published on terraced landscapes in Slovenia in connection with the project. The years 2007 and 2008 were one of the two peak periods of publishing about Slovenia’s terraced landscapes.

The development of agriculture in Slovenia (as a Yugoslav Republic) was highly ideologically laden after 1945 and remained so at least until 1971 (Petek 2005). Most published studies on terraces before the ALPTER project dealt with terraced vineyards. Vrišer (1954) described the abandonment of cultivated terraces in the Upper and Central Gorizia Hills and the transformation of terraced plantations in the Lower Gorizia Hills in his study on the Gorizia Hills. Melik (1960) mentioned the same process for the Koper Hills. A year before the conference of winegrowers from Istria, the Kvarner Gulf, and the Slovenian coast was held in Portorož (1960), one of its initiators, Simčič (1959), presented an initiative for a plan to renovate terraced vineyards. Around the same time, some investment programs envisioned renovation of vineyards and orchards on terraces in eastern Slovenia (Tomaž 1959; Jeruzlem-Ormož 1960; Ljutomer 1962). Terracing was obviously an important theme at the beginning of the 1960s; the archives contain bachelor’s theses on terraces in vineyards at the time (Kociper 1962) and on the renewal of vineyards on steep slopes (Ražem 1964). Addressing the social and geographical problems of the

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Koper countryside in the light of historical development and economic changes, Titl (1965) studied cultivated terraces in Istria in southwest Slovenia in detail, including the typology of terraces, the causes for their abandonment, and a topographic map defining cultivated terraces, partly cultivated terraces, abandoned terraces, and destroyed terraces. In eastern Slovenia, after a major wine crisis between the two world wars and no systematic renewal of vineyards, which were also devastated and exhausted as a result of artillery bombardment during the war and as a result of labor shortages, new terraces for vineyards were constructed under communism (Bračič 1967). This transformation has completely altered the appearance of the cultural landscape in the Slovenian Hills (Belec 1968), where terrace renovation carried out in the national, public, or social sector during this period encompassed 80–90% of all areas (Simonič 2014). A practical guide to setting up vineyards (Colnarič 1971), in which the introductory part offers guidelines for various types of construction of terraced vineyards using agricultural machinery, is later summarized in two further books by the same author (Colnarič et al. 1985; Colnarič and Vrabl 1991). Colnarič’s work was the basis for delivering practical information to farmers at agricultural lectures in the Littoral Region, which promoted knowledge as a key factor in agricultural development (Škvarč 1999, 2001; Kodrič 1999). Vršič and Lešnik (2005) also refer to Colnarič when discussing terracing of slopes, but they add new graphic material and some new interpretations of terracing. Colnarič served as the advisor for a 1993 thesis on three-row terraces and their impact on the growth, development, and fertility of grapevines depending on the types of distance from the edge of the terrace (Ozmec 1993). Among these comprehensive studies on terraced vineyards, one can find a rare contribution on how to handle orchards on terraces (Modic 1979). In 1990, a conference was held at which two papers were presented on terraced landscapes: The first dealt with the physical geographical significance of cultivated terraces and typology (Drobnjak 1990), and the second discussed opportunities to intensify their production (Kladnik 1990). A study of viticulture and terminology connected with terraces and old viticultural techniques in villages near Koper from the mid-nineteenth century to the 1950s (Presl 1995) presents important historical data. Some years later, agricultural advisers pointed out (Škvarč et al. 2002) that terraces had already been constructed on slope inclinations below 15% and that changing terraced vineyards into vertical plantations was unjustified because this would accelerate erosion and drought. Agricultural advisers in the Littoral Region also continually emphasized that constructing terraced vineyards is the best method for managing agricultural land on steep slopes (Škvarč and Kodrič 2007).

At the initiative of the ALPTER project, a recovery project for terrace construction in the village of Medana was prepared and carried out (Ažman Momirski and Berčič 2007a). A detailed process with the result of the recovery and also including general recommendations of terrace construction techniques for farmers and builders was published in a manual (Ažman Momirski et al. 2007). The Slovenian contribution to the two publications of ALPTER project, the atlas and the manual, was a description of the terraced vineyards of the Gorizia Hills (Ažman Momirski 2008a, 2014), a risk assessment of the slopes of the Gorizia Hills

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(Komac and Zorn 2008), and a detailed study of the preparation, construction, and construction assessment of the terraced slope in Medana (Ažman Momirski et al. 2008). The results of Slovenian research on terraced landscapes, terraced landscapes in the southern and northern Gorizia Hills, and in Medana and Kožbana were published in parallel with Slovenian (Ažman Momirski 2008b, c, d). The International Conference Living Terraced Landscapes, held in Ljubljana at the conclusion of the ALPTER project, demonstrated that more experts in Slovenia deal with terraced landscapes than is immediately apparent (Living Terraced Landscapes 2008). Attentive planning of terraced landscapes is based not only on geotechnical terrain characteristics, but also on principles of sustainable development—which take into account the ecological aspects (design that complies with the local flora, fauna, terrain, bedrock, materials, climate conditions, and topography, as well as use of native plants and conserving existing flora and fauna), cultural aspects (respecting the local cultural landscape), and visual sustainability (Ribičič and Musek 2008). Vineyards on slopes are among the land-use types most exposed to slope mass movements in Slovenia (Jemec and Komac 2008), and landslides present a constant problem in the Gorizia Hills, affecting viticulture on slopes (Komac and Zorn 2008). In this respect, it was essential to show the positive results of the parametric stability studies carried out to prove the correctness of the plan for the recovery of terraced vineyards in settlement of Medana (Petkovšek et al. 2008). The first attempt to review all terraced landscapes in Slovenia, including their typologies, was introduced during a conference (Ažman Momirski and Kladnik 2008, 2009, 2012), as was an overview of vineyards and orchards on terraces in the Littoral Region (Škvarč and Kodrič 2008). Hauptman speaks about the Drava Valley wine region, where terraces were built between 1960 and 1990. After that time, wine production on terraces decreased, even though the humid climate has changed into an arid one due to climate change and terraces are the only reasonable option for revitalizing wine production (Štabuc and Hauptman 2008). Rebernišek (2008) presented the possibility of maintaining vineyards on steep slopes with mini-terraces. Hudoklin (2008) recognized terraced landscapes as areas of landscape identity that are changing significantly in some part of Slovenia. Prosen and Lisec (2008) emphasized a holistic approach toward the conservation of terraced landscapes, taking into account social, economic, and environmentally sustainable development.

After attempts to review all terraced landscapes in Slovenia, including their typologies (Ažman Momirski and Kladnik 2008, 2009, 2012), such studies expanded (Križaj Smrdel 2010a, b). The project to revitalize vineyards in the terraced landscape on the Karst ridge above Trieste aimed to recover the functional features of existing routes to improve access to agricultural land and thereby enhance cultivation on the terraces (Kačič and Lidén 2011).

The second peak period of publishing about Slovenia’s terraced landscapes followed two world conferences on terraced landscapes: the Second World Conference on Terraced Landscapes (Peru 2014) and the Third World Conference on Terraced Landscapes (Italy 2016). A national research project focusing entirely on terraced landscapes in Slovenia concluded in 2014 and was then extended until the end of 2015 (Terraced Landscapes in Slovenia as Cultural Values 2016). Terraced slopes