Le Moment Pascalien dans la Querelle de la Grâce

From 1643, the catholic quarrel on grace sees the clash of three theological parties, that of the Jesuits, won oven to molinism, that of the dominicans, defenders of thomism, and that of the jansenists, partisans of a return to strict augustinism but equally concerned with defending themselves from accusations of heresy by putting forward their conformity with thomism. The present article attempts to follow the evolution of the different currents in the time of the crisis of 1655–1657 by utilizing the contemporary texts of Blaise Pascal as an observatory and by showing how the jansenists gradually liquidated the middle solution of a molinizing thomism.     

Reclip:more Kleinr?umige Klimaszenarien für ?sterreich

Der letzte Bericht des Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC 2007) erl?utert die weltweiten Auswirkungen des Klimawandels deutlich – allerdings aus globaler Sicht. Um zu kl?ren wie sich das regionale Klima in ?sterreich ver?ndern wird, wurde mit dem Projekt „reclip:more“ (Research for Climate Protection: Model Run Evaluation) eine erste kleinr?umige Datenbasis für Klimaschutz und Klimafolgenforschung für ?sterreich generiert. Klimaszenarien wurden mittels regionaler Klimamodelle (RCMs) für die Alpen als 10 × 10-Kilometer-Raster und mit anschlie?endem Downscaling für ?sterreich mit einer Zielaufl?sung 1 km entwickelt. Die RCMs wurden mit ERA-40 Reanalyse-Daten der Vergangenheit und Daten eines Zukunftsszenarios des globalen Klimamodells (GCM) ECHAM5 angetrieben, um retrospektive (1981 bis 1990) und künftige (2041 bis 2050) Klimadatens?tze für die Alpen zu berechnen und M?glichkeiten und Unsicherheiten der Modelle und Downscaling-Methoden für die Alpen zu evaluieren. Die nun vorliegenden Datens?tze und weitere, die im Folgeprojekt „reclip:century“ für alternative Treibhausgasszenarien bis 2100 berechnet werden, dienen dazu als Basis für Aussagen über ?kologische und sozio?konomische Entwicklungen im Hinblick auf den Klimawandel.     

Wine and olive oil permeation in pitched and non-pitched ceramics: relation with results from archaeological amphorae from Sagalassos,Turkey

Pitch compounds are frequently identified inside archaeological ceramic vessels. As their presence might affect the permeation of oil or wine into the ceramic fabric, experiments were conducted in which the diffusion of lipids or polyphenols into pitched and non-pitched modern vessels was followed by chemical analysis. Results show that the polyphenols of wine can intrude into the ceramics even through a pitch layer. Consequently, the absence of polyphenols in archaeological sherds is not due to their inability to reach the ceramic matrix under the pitch layer. By contrast, a pitch layer is quite effective to avoid oil intrusion into the ceramic matrix. Thus, it seems logical that oil amphorae would have been coated with pitch at the inside prior to use. Experiments in which the pitched ceramic was simultaneously exposed to oil and wine, show that the wine makes the pitch more permeable for the lipid compounds. These experimental data are confronted with residue analysis results obtained on amphorae fragments excavated in Sagalassos, Turkey. Pitch and oil were frequently found together. Based on a polyphenol test, indications for wine storage could only be obtained for two vessels. Against this background, the possible uses of the Sagalassos amphorae are discussed, and the traditional association of pine pitch with wine storage in archaeological amphorae is critically assessed.     

When Strategic Plans Fail to Lead. A Complexity Acknowledging Perspective on Decision-Making in Urban Development Projects—The Case of Kortrijk (Belgium)

Nowadays, cities formulate long-term strategies to address the challenges and opportunities they face. Numerous strategic plans or planning instruments are developed for this purpose. In this article, we would like to examine the role, impact and relevance of these types of plans in decision-making processes concerning urban development projects (UDPs) in the Flemish Region of Belgium. To what extent do strategic plans succeed in capturing and steering the complexity of spatial interventions in contemporary urban contexts? We argue that a complexity-acknowledging perspective provides a more realistic and adequate view here by seeing strategic plans as only one among many elements in the set of tangled inter- and intrastrategic processes which together determine UDPs. A comparative and qualitative case study was carried out in the city of Kortrijk. The decision-making of three UDPs was studied thoroughly. Interviewing key actors and analysing policy documents helped us to (re)construct the complex decision-making processes and to stipulate the meaning of all involved formal plans and planning tools.     

Persistence of the cultural landscape in Campania (Southern Italy) before the AD 472 Vesuvius eruption: archaeoenvironmental data

Cultural landscapes were prominent during the Early Roman period when agronomic knowledge allowed the spread of intensive land exploitation in most of the available land. The aim of this contribution is to explore whether for the Campania region (Southern Italy) archaeoenvironmental data would support continuity or change in the cultural landscape of Roman tradition in the 4th and 5th centuries. To do so, new data from two sites located on the northern slopes of the Vesuvius, both buried by the AD 472 eruption have been investigated. Charcoal analysis, ¹⁴C dating, and chemical analysis of organic residues were carried out in order to study the landscape and the food production at these sites. The results suggest the persistence of the Roman cultural landscape until the 4th and 5th centuries in this area. The landscape is in fact strongly marked both in agriculture and woodland exploitation and management, being characterized by managed chestnut forests as well as valuable cultivations of walnut, large vineyards, olive groves, and probably orchards and crops. The integrated approach with archaeobotanical and archaeometric analyses proves to be a powerful method for the study of the past landscapes, providing a good insight into the environment. Furthermore, this study provided the most ancient evidence of chestnut silviculture for wood.     

Para-masticatory wear facets and their functional significance in hunter–gatherer maxillary molars

The mastication of tough and hard foods combined with the extensive use of teeth as tools, have been considered possible antemortem causes in determining enamel microfractures of the tooth crown. This phenomenon, known as dental chipping, has been found in different fossil hominins and in several pre-historic and historic human populations who adopted different subsistence strategies. However, little is understood of the mechanism, function and the formation of dental chipping.     

Hunter–gatherer responses to environmental change during the Pleistocene–Holocene transition in the southern North Sea basin: Final Palaeolithic–Final Mesolithic land use in northwest Belgium

Situated along the southern fringe of the North Sea basin, northwest Belgium holds great potential for understanding hunter–gatherer responses to environmental change at the Pleistocene–Holocene transition. Recent intensive fieldwork has yielded valuable data on the palaeoenvironment, chronology, and hunter–gatherer mobility and land use in this region. At the Late Glacial/Early Holocene transition this region was comprised of a landscape of coversand ridges and lakes that flanked the northern part of the Scheldt river basin. This landscape was highly productive for hunter–gatherer populations. As the landscape developed in response to the increasing water table caused by the inundation of the North Sea populations responded by changing their forms of mobility and land use. These changes are indicated by the reduction in the number and density of sites, as well as their geographical settings, from the Late Glacial (Federmesser) and Early Mesolithic to the Middle-Final Mesolithic. Late Glacial/Early Mesolithic sites indicate much higher mobility comprised of rapid displacements of camps and re-occupation of the same coversand ridges over long time-spans. Middle/Late Mesolithic sites indicate a reduction in mobility, increasing focus on prolonged riverside settlement, and a more rigid organization of residential sites.     

Determining the provenance of black limestone artifacts using petrography,isotopes and EPR techniques: the case of the monument of Bocco

This paper investigates the provenance of the black limestone of the monument known as Bocco, named after the king of Mauretania who presented Silla with this work as a sign of his submission to the power of Rome. A multi-method approach, comprising petrographic observations, carbon and oxygen isotope composition and electron paramagnetic resonance (EPR) spectra characteristics, was used for this purpose. The monument is part of a reconstruction of a rectangular base (approx. 8 × 2 m) which is likely to have served as the base for a bronze statuary group and is currently composed of six blocks of limestone whose exterior is engraved with a fine frieze. The results of the different analyses were compared with the data of a published database of the most important black limestone quarries exploited during Roman times in the Mediterranean area. The petrographic and physico-chemical parameters did not prove to be very effective in determining the provenance of the black limestone of Bocco; the isotopes result even raised some uncertainty as to whether all six blocks came from the same quarry, though this doubt was dispelled by the EPR data and, above all, by the evident petrographic similarity between them. Differences in the isotopic composition of the various blocks may be due to an in situ rock alteration process caused by interaction with an aqueous fluid. It was, however, impossible to determine with certainty the origin of the material of the stone artifact using the database available; it is possible that the black limestone of Bocco came from an ancient quarry that is likely to be located in north western Africa but has not yet been uncovered. An alternative hypothesis, according to which the limestone used for the monument of Bocco came from the ancient quarry of Ain el Ksir, one of the Tunisian quarries present in the database, is also discussed.