Agricultural History Review, Volume 57 Part 1 (2009), p. 151

It is about 45 years since I first set eyes on a French cadastral map. It was housed in the old taxation offices in Rouen and depicted the early nineteenth-century pattern of property units for a commune in the Pays de Bray whose marshes and uncultivated land had been divided, reclaimed and converted into improved pasture after the Revolution. That cluster of processes, set in a wider context, became the centrepiece of my first piece of research in historical geography. It also made use of cadastral revisions dating from the early and middle years of the twentieth century, as well as summaries for two dates in the second half of the nineteenth century. Detailed registers, indicating ownership, land use, land quality and tax to be levied, were complemented by cadastral maps. With a measure of patience that I now find unbelievable, I waded through vast amounts of cadastral data to chart the emergence of the Pays de Bray as a focus of livestock husbandry, dairying and cheese making. In later years, cadastral information entered into other projects but my youthful patience, which allowed information to be plotted parcel by parcel, had become very much a thing of the past.

In 1992, Roger Kain and Elizabeth Baigent edited The cadastral map in the service of the state (University of Chicago Press), which traced the history of landownership mapping in various parts of Europe and in colonial territories overseas. Their handsome book is now complemented by three volumes under the general title De l’estime au cadastre en Europe, which examine medieval, early modern, and nineteenth- and twentieth-century cadastral surveys, and assemble the proceedings of conferences held in June and December 2003 and in January 2005. The 20 essays that comprise the third volume explore the diversity of cadastral surveys in Europe, chart the ‘invention’ of the new cadastre in France after 1789, offer examples of land-ownership surveys in selected cities, and present wide-ranging reflections on cadastral experience.

Between 1718 and 1757 a cadastral survey, incorporating detailed investigation and recording of individual plots and buildings, was undertaken in the Duchy of Milan as part of the fiscal reforms introduced by Charles VI, Emperor of Austria. The Duke of Savoy instigated a comparable survey in adjacent territories between 1728 and 1738. Modern cadastral activities in continental Europe partly owe their origins to these enterprises but also to rather more generalized attempts to link taxation to land quality, use and ownership instigated in the Paris Basin, Corsica and many other parts of Europe during the eighteenth century. Napoleonic conquests brought versions of the French cadastral system to the Low Countries (F.K.Buisman), the German lands (W.H.Stein) and Italy (A.Buccaro). Projects to introduce cadastral surveys à la française in Spain (M.Perez Picaza) and Bosnia (A.Y.Kaya) were not successful, and the continental style of cadastral survey was not implemented in England and Wales, although tithe records and maps offer interesting points of comparison (R.Kain, E.Baigent and D.Fletcher).

The second cluster of essays traces French experience in some detail from the initial need to devise new forms of taxation to replace the diverse fiscal systems of the ancien régime, through very early nineteenth-century surveys of land use and quality from which tax levies were to be projected, to the harsh realization that every plot of land and every building in the country would have to be surveyed if this method for raising revenue were to be equitable and efficient. This massive task was completed in every commune in the land between 1828 and 1845 (N.Vivier) but soon became out of date as property changed hands or was consolidated or fragmented, as land uses changed, and as land was improved or abandoned. After lengthy debate, intricate revisions were introduced in the early twentieth century and after 1950, with new maps and registers being drawn up (S.Devigne). Current cadastral information is now computerized in France and is subject to constant revision. Lawyers and property developers may undertake their enquiries at the click of a mouse (and payment of a fee) but for historians and historical geographers the muscle-building days of working with enormous registers that relate to earlier times are not over (P.Jaillard, M.Kasser).

The six essays that make up the third and final sections of this volume focus on early nineteenth-century cadastral surveys in Paris, Bordeaux, Naples and Rome, and revisit the on-going challenge of generating an accurate landownership record in France and Spain. The text of De l’estime au cadastre is complemented by an array of maps and facsimiles, eight of which are in full colour. The editors are to be congratulated for drawing an array of conference papers into a fairly cohesive book that will provide good service to researchers as a reference volume.