The Cultural-historical value of Traditional Agricultural Landscape in Slovakia

The historical development of settlements in Slovakia and long term agricultural cultivation created diverse traditional agricultural landscapes that have been preserved despite the pressures of modern land development and intensive agriculture. A national inventory of traditional agricultural landscapes identified the remnants of traditional agricultural landscape in Slovakia by using visual interpretations of aerial photos and field surveys. The historical value of traditional agricultural landscape is evaluated on the basis of the characteristic features: (a) preserved small scale structure of plot division; (b) presence of typical agrarian landforms (e.g. terraces, walls); (c) unchanged land use during the collectivization of agriculture; (d) the use of some traditional agricultural technologies. Traditional use was verified using historical maps from pre-collectivization era, archive documents and published data. The cultural-historical value was signified by: the degree of preservation of structural features like original plot division and land terracing, shape and size of land, type of bounds, land use, and original farming techniques. The cultural-historical value was evaluated on three case study areas. The cultural and historical heritage of the traditional agriculture also includes verbal, musical and visual forms of folk art.