Fiumi e foreste. Prospettive storiche sulle fluitazioni in Europa / Rivers and Forests. Historical Perspectives on Timber Floating in Europe

During the centuries of the early modern period, the demand for wood increased in a widespread way due to demographic growth, the development of rural (and urban) manufacturing, and new military and civil needs. This context forms the background to the history of timber floating in all the European areas where it was practiced. For the development and growth of the timber industry, complex infrastructure systems became essential to reach forests far from waterways. Floating was a complex system of river transport that made it possible to exploit a resource that would otherwise be unusable. The development of the railways in the nineteenth century, followed by road transport in the twentieth century, certainly offered alternatives, but did not put an immediate end to timber floating that, due to its great cost-effectiveness, continued to be practiced in several regions of Europe at least until the middle of the twentieth century.