Seite - 8 - in The Power of Urban Water - Studies in premodern urbanism

8 AnnetteHaugandUlrichMüller nomena.Floodsand ice jamsaresuchphenomena, forwhichpre-modernsocietieswerescarce- lyequipped. Ice jamsandsubsequent floodscanthreaten thewholecity,but theycanalsohave a tremendous impact on urban subspaces and on the relationship between the city and the surrounding countryside. Inhis article, hepoints outhowpeople tried tominimise these risks. This includednotonlyconstructionworks,butalsoadministrative interventionsandneighbour- hoodcooperation. While Rohr explicitly focuses on awide-ranging perspective, water also has a significant role as a ‘risk factor’ for Rainer Schreg. He shows howmedieval urban infrastructure used waternetworksasa resource.Theestablishmentofa townona riveror lakehadahuge impact on ecology. The author describes the ‘projected’ influence of urbanwatermanagement on the hinterland and rural landscapes, but also theunintended effects of urbanisation onhydrology and landscapes.Here, not only the direct relations between city and rural surroundings are of importance. In the sense of a ‘big history’, Schreg associates economic, social and ecological consequenceswith the latemedieval ‘crisis’ and itsprocessesof transformation.Bothcontribu- tions thus illustrate the role water played in urban development. In addition, they show that urbanwater systemsarealsomutually related to the ‘waterscapes’ of the surroundingcountry- side.Against this background,water proves tobean integral feature of urbanization. Urbanwater and theprocessof urbanization Water isoneof thebasic factors forurbandevelopment. Thesignificanceofwater forurbaniza- tion processes has to be investigated in itsmultidimensionality.Water and the urban environ- ment formadynamicandmultifunctionalnetwork.Forurbandevelopment, thephysical,natu- ralwater landscape is initially a startingpoint. This canhave adeterminant effect, but human interventionwas targetedat changingwater systems.These find their expression inamultitude of cultural, institutional and conceptual practices and frameworks. Legal and administrative regulations, but also everyday practices are expressions of these relationships. Two contribu- tionsdealwith these topics. With a focus on the Middle and Upper Rhine Valley and against the background of late medievalwrittensources,GabrielZeilingerdescribesnotonlyenvironmentalaspects,butalso political constellations.Waterwasnot least apart of the conflicts in the complex relationships between the various social andpolitical actors in the cities.Waterwas thusnot only anatural elementandaneconomicfactor,butalsoanegotiatedandsometimescontestedresource.Water shaped the city’s own logic and thus stands for specific historical constellations.However, the treatment ofwater in urbandevelopment can also be an expression of similar prerequisites or behaviours. In this sense, ports, for example, as interfaces between the city and ‘the outside world’ are an expression of physical conditions, but also of historical andpath-dependent pat- terns.UlrichMüller studies these relationships on the basis of three port towns in Northern Europe. By conceptualizingharbourscapes, hedescribes themultidimensionality of ports as an urbanarea fromEarly toHighMedieval times.The theoreticalapproachof the ‘-scapes’ (ethnos- capes, technoscapes, financescapes, ideoscapes,mediascapes) is used to study the urban sub- spaceof the ‘port’asaplaceofglobalization inpre-moderntimes.Harbourscapesconnectwater and land,but theportasaplaceofencounterneitherbeginsnorendswith thequays.Harbour- scapes serve as an area for social, cultural and political interactions, processes of transforma- tion,whichmanifest themselves in concrete urban locations. Finally, both contributionsmake evident that research into urbanization and water systems can only be carried out within a transdisciplinary framework.