An Environmental History of Wildlife in England 1650-1950

(^8) an environmenTal hisTory of Wildlife in england
farming and biodiversity
The spread of farmed landscapes from early prehistoric times was bad news
for a number of species, especially the large mammals which predated on
crops and livestock. The auroch disappeared during the Bronze Age; the
bear probably before the Roman period; the lynx not long after it; and while
figure 2 Early-modern farming regions (after Thirsk 1987). This pattern, which
emerged in the later Middle Ages, overlay and complicated the more basic structures
of settlement and field systems shown in Figure 1.