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guaranteeing the persistence of public land boundaries, while also noting that the persistence of boundaries is “strengthened by the tendency in urban settlements, at least from the late Middle Ages on, to construct dwellings along boundary lines”¹⁸ (Gauthiez 1999, p. 19).

      The persistence of older forms is not, therefore, exclusively a result of the persistence of the constructions themselves (shapes). Nevertheless, up until the 1990s, researchers still struggled to explain this persistence without resorting to the notion of continuum. There is an uninterrupted link between past and present, the result of multi-generational memory or, in the longer term, of the persistence of material remains, functions and the cadastral plan (Robert 2003a). This approach excludes the possibility of temporal hiatuses or non-linear temporalities.

1.2.3. Drivers of change

      Nevertheless, these early morphologists were well aware of the existence of change. This is evident in reactions to Meitzen’s suggestion that 19th-century parcel arrangements were a direct reflection of divisions established centuries earlier. Marc Bloch drew inspiration from Meitzen’s work, but situated his regressive method within a more dynamic view of history. Refusing to see the past as a still photograph, Bloch preferred a cinematic metaphor:

If we use our common sense, we shall see that the picture presented by the recent past is not an image we merely need to project over and over again in order to reproduce that of centuries more and more remote; what the recent past offers resembles rather the last reel of a film which we must try to unroll, resigned to the gaps we shall certainly discover, resolved to pay due regard to its sensitivity as a register of change. (Bloch 1966, p. xxx)¹⁹

      If, then, the landscape is in a state of perpetual change, how can we justify the use of cadastral plans, modern or contemporary maps to study ancient or medieval forms? According to A. Verhulst, these documents constitute a valid source in cases where there is no doubt in the matter of historical sequentiality (Verhulst 1995, p. 20). In order to deduct the past from the present or, conversely, the present from the past, the observed state must be precisely situated within a logical progression. The feasibility of regressive studies is thus contingent on the conceptualization of this progression or sequence.

      In the 19th and the first half of the 20th century, evolutionism, as defined in the natural sciences, was seen as a coherent framework for describing change. Social scientists used these tools to compare different types of civilizations, based on an idea of progress, defined by Enlightenment philosophers as the ultimate goal for humanity. Evolution appeared to offer the means of attaining this goal, by means of a collective movement through a chain of states, with each clearly situated on a linear and cumulative timeline. Given a logical organization of time into a series of periods, it would then be possible to work backwards. In the words of Marc Bloch:

Let us then agree, since we have no choice, to follow the trail backwards, one careful step at a time, examining irregularities and variations as they come, avoiding the all-too-common error of trying to leap at a bound from the 18th century to the Neolithic age. (Bloch 1966, p. xxx)²⁰

Bloch’s reference to pierre polie in the original French (translated here as “Neolithic”) is significant, highlighting the role of technology as an essential factor in the attainment of different developmental stages (Latour 1991). This is further evident in the 19th-century classification of ancient societies: “stone age”, “iron age”, etc. Material and technical characteristics were essential criteria, used in the emerging sciences of ethnology and archeology to define different cultures.

      The notion of age is ever-present in the study of morphology; some researchers expressed concern that the continued survival of past forms into the present might hinder the attainment of an optimum state by means of evolution. For Marcel Poëte, there was:

[...] a difficulty in reconciling the highly-evolved living conditions of the modern day with these persistent remains. How can ancient country paths, evolving into roads, be suitable for automobile circulation, in a city which has, itself, lasted from a past agricultural age to the current age of powerful industrialization without casting off its old skin? (Poëte 2000, p. 23)²¹

      The notion of age is also integral to the cycle of erosion concept in geomorphology, introduced by William M. Davis (1850–1934) and popularized in France by Henri Baulig (Masutti 2002). In this idealized model, landforms develop through a series of evolutions, step by step, finally resulting – when conditions allow – in a peneplain. The erosion cycle concept provides a means of explaining evolutions in a landscape. Under the effects of erosion, relief goes through a number of different “ages”, from youth to maturity and onto old age. Davis believed that, using this model, the past and future states of a relief form could be predicted based on observations of a present state (Meynier 1969, p. 58).

At the same time, the image of the living organism was also being used to describe towns or cities, seen to traverse a series of ages. Poëte, for example, introduced an idea similar to those used in geomorphology, the “vital cycle”²², in the context of urban development:

In studying this city in the past, we do not look at a skeleton, but rather at a living being, younger in age than at present. The city, as a collectivity, is subject to the effects of time over the course of its existence, in the same way as an individual; at any given time, it has an age. The notion of the vital cycle, used in geography with respect to the landforms, is thus crucial to the study of urban settlements. (Poëte 1924, p. 1)²³

      Using this approach, Poëte analyzed the dynamics of a town or city by comparing it to a living being. Elements are transformed in one direction, from birth to death, making it possible to “discern the degree of evolution” at any given time (Poëte 2000, pp. 83–84). This logical sequence of known steps (birth, maturity, death) can be followed in both directions, to travel back in time (regressive history) and to improve our understanding of the present.

      Thus, historians may use the present to understand the past in the absence of source material for older periods. For geographers, on the other hand, incursions into the past give a better understanding of the present, and only the elements which are helpful for this purpose will be retained. In history, this approach is called “regressive”, whereas in geography, the term “retrospective” is used (Dion 1949). In both cases, time is considered as a continuous line, in which the present never completely eliminates legacies from the past. Past and present are linked by a logical chain, as Jean Brunhes and Camille Vallaux put it in their 1921 work examining the relationship between geography and history. For these authors, history offers the means of placing an isolated fact “into the stream of life which produced it”, as “one link in a chain” (Brunhes and Vallaux 1921, p. 21).

      1.2.4. Primary forms: a non-evolving landscape

      From the outset, however, the regressive analysis approach to history was confronted with a difficulty: that of studying landscapes which are in a constant state of evolution. Without a general framework for studying the evolution of human societies, it is hard to interpret plans or documents beyond their date of production. This led to a focus on planned parcel systems which marked a clear change from previous landscape patterns, for example following periods of land clearance. From a methodological perspective, a distinction was made between two types of landscape, of which A. Verhulst summarized the characteristics.

A landscape is called “primary”:

... when it has undergone no major changes since its formation at a given moment in the Middle Ages [...] In this case, as a general rule, it will have been

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