The history of irrigation and water control in China's erhai catchment

Abstract

This chapter introduces an interdisciplinary methodology that combines the use of archaeological and documentary sources alongside environmental proxy indicators found in sedimentary archives to assess, on a hydrological catchment scale, historical human impacts on hydrology. The advantages and benefits of this technique are demonstrated through the results taken from ongoing work on a case study, Erhai in Yunnan province, China. This approach allows us to increase understanding of local knowledge, vulnerability, mitigation, adaptation, and resilience to local, regional, and globally derived environment and climate change. Show more