Landscape Archaeology: Science, heritage and sustainability

Landscape studies are closely related, and strongly benefit, from Landscape Archaeology. As a tool to understanding the past, Archaeology enables the landscape to benefit from the rich heritage it includes. In this paper we outline what this concept truly means, including the diversity of origins and the multiple ramifications it has for society and territorial planning as a whole. Afterwards, an example of applied scientific activity in a particular type of landscape: Roman gold mining areas has resulted in one of the most richly studied and best preserved cultural landscapes in Europe. The pro-active attitude on behalf of research which has been applied in some examples from the Hispanic Northwest is a model which can be applied to many other depressed regions of the continent, where mining activity has left behind only poverty and abandonment.