Evaluating the Impacts of Nitrate Vulnerable Zones on the Environment and Farmers’ Practices: A Scottish Case Study

Nitrate vulnerable zones (NVZs) have been established throughout Europe to tackle diffuse pollution. This research investigates the attitudes and practices of farmers in the River Eden catchment, within the Strathmore and Fife NVZ in eastern Scotland, and explores how these changed between 2002 and 2011. Attitudes were investigated using interviews; efficiency of nutrient use was evaluated using farm gate nutrient budgets (NBs). Most of the 16 farmers regard NVZ regulations as burdensome and costly; however, attitudes to NVZs became more positive during the period. NBs demonstrated that arable farms generate the least nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P) surpluses, dairy the most. N efficiency improved on nine farms and declined on two; P efficiency improved on 12 farms and declined on two. Overall, the 16 farms were using 13% less N and 19% less P in 2011 compared with 2003. Water quality data demonstrate that Nitrate N in the catchment's main rivers dropped between 2004 and 2011 by a mean of 15.5%, whereas mean phosphate P declined very little. Legacy P and Inefficient sewerage treatment facilities may explain the latter finding. Results demonstrate that NVZ regulations, combined with economic pressures, have affected farmers’ attitudes and behaviour, resulting in significant improvements in surface water quality.     

Charles Gleyre's ‘Les Romains’: Classics and nationalism in Swiss art

This article looks at an example of how classical antiquity was used by a nineteenth‐century Swiss painter and explores the national dimension of one of his works. Through an examination of the painting, Les Romains passant sous le joug, its Swiss artist Charles Gleyre and his commission from the canton of Vaud, it will elaborate an example of how a classical legend was transformed in an artistic representation of the nation.     

The Militia Ordinance of 1642 and the 14th‐Century Great Statute of Praemunire

This article opens with a review of the important scholarship concerning the conflict over prerogative between the crown and parliament from mid 1641 through the winter of 1642. The resulting impasse was over which of these institutions would control the militia. This article argues that the Militia Ordinance committee was committed to ‘the legal process’ in developing its directive of March 1642. The balance of the study reviews the medieval Statute of Praemunire, its subsequent development, and how that law would have provided an essential basis for the parliament to assume control of the militia. The article concludes that the Long Parliament acted legally with the Great Statute of Praemunire as a reference point for the adoption of the Militia Ordinance. This conclusion rests on five evidentiary considerations: (i) surviving texts of Commons’ private diarists; (ii) the probable role of John Selden in the Militia Ordinance committee deliberations; (iii) the September 1642 publication of John Marsh's An Argument Or, Debate In Law of the Great Question Concerning the Militias; (iv) proposition five of the Nineteen Propositions; and (v) language parallels between the 1393 Great Statute and the Militia Ordinance itself.     

Risk and the Sacred: Environment,Media and Public Opinion in Bali

This exploration of controversies over environmental regulation in the Indonesian province of Bali traces the relationship between the media, environmental attitudes and Balinese identity, focusing on the religious dimension of that identity and the ways in which this has become bound up with conceptions of environmental imbalance and a popular critique of capitalist development on the island. The fusion of cultural and environmental metaphors of ‘erosion’ and ‘preservation’ in public discourse is striking in the Balinese case, since sites of great spiritual significance are also attractive to investors for their aesthetic appeal and heritage value (Verschuuren et al. 2010). From the earliest emergence of environmental conflict on the island, the emotive power of cultural identity became intimately connected with environmental politics. This article traces several of the pervasive and interconnected dichotomies ‐ sacred and profane, cultural value and economic interest, environmental preservation and use (exploitation), certainty and uncertainty (risk) ‐ that characterise debates surrounding environmental regulation and development on the island.     

‘Birds,bogs and forestry’ revisited: The significance of the flow country controversy

This paper evaluates the significance of the battle between forest and conservation interests in the Flow Country of northern Scotland during the late 1980s. It summarises the key arguments for and against afforestation as they were presented at the time, and reviews their validity in the light of subsequent developments. Commercial afforestation was claimed to be an economically valuable land use in a region with few alternatives, whereas conservationists presented the Flow Country as a wetland habitat of international significance. The controversy had far‐reaching consequences both for forest practice and nature conservation in Scotland and the UK. The break‐up of the Nature Conservancy Council and the remit given to Scottish Natural Heritage, the negative public perception of commercial forestry, the adoption of multiple objective forest management, Indicative Forest Strategies, and the participatory philosophy in conservation, can all be wholly or partly traced to the controversy. Ultimately, the controversy is shown to have had positive outcomes both for conservation and forest practice.     

Evidence for volcanic ash fall in the Maya Lowlands from a reservoir at Tikal,Guatemala

Powder X-ray diffraction and petrographic analyses of reservoir sediments from Tikal, Guatemala have identified significant quantities of decomposed volcanic ash in the form of smectite and euhedral bipyramidal quartz crystals. X-ray fluorescence trace element content analysis was used to eliminate distant Sahara-Sahel and Antilles sources. The Zr/Y and Ni/Cr ratios of reservoir sediment from Tikal are consistent with a source from Central American volcanism (e.g., Guatemalan and Salvadoran). AMS radiocarbon dating of the smectite and crystalline quartz-rich reservoir sediments show that volcanic ash fell during the Preclassic, Classic, and Postclassic Maya cultural periods. It may now be possible to develop an effective chronology of ash fall at Tikal and the greater Peten.     

The Nature and History of the Birkat Isra'il and its Relation to the Pool 'With the Expanse of the Sea' (Sir 50: 3): Rereading Charles Warren

Abstract

The Birkat Isra'il was the largest pool in Jerusalem when it was constructed. Yet when it is studied, it is often done in connection with the extent of the Temple Platform rather than for its own sake. Charles Warren studied the pool in considerable detail yet several aspects of it remain unexplained, particularly its location within the es-Sahireh valley. Data provided by Warren suggest that the Herodian form of the pool is a secondary construction and that a previous pool had been situated directly over the lowest point of the valley and that this is the pool 'with the expanse of the sea' (Sir 50: 3) built by Simon II.