Soil Erosion and The Erosion of Civilizations :: Soil Erosion

Soil erosion began with the dawn of agriculture, when people toss their hunter-gatherer lifestyles and began using the land for intensive agriculture, thus removing the protective vegetation deny and growing food crops on disturbed injury get ons. For many civilizations, it is believed that surface wash erosion, that can occur unnoticed until it is too late, was a of import contributing factor for their demise. Soil erosion and other degradative processes have destroyed, all over the millennia, as much arable land as is now cultivated. The Phoenicians, the roman Empire, Mesopotamia, and ancient peoples of present-day Syria and Lebanon are all believed to have collapsed as a result of de woodation, erosion, and salination in the Middle East. In the Indus valley civilizations have suffered the resembling fate. The collapse of a 1700-year-old Mayan civilization in Guatemala around 900 A.D. is also attributed to quicken soil erosion. Mollisols developed on limestone bedrock were easily eroded when the forest was cleared. As the population increased, soil depletion set in and the Maya culture quick declined. Soils of south and Central America supported thriving civilization ache before the European settlers discovered the new world. Incas conserved soil and water by constructing stone-walled bench terraces such as those at Machu Picchu, Peru. The turn out topsoil was rapidly washed away, however, once maintenance of the terrace outline was neglected. Much of Latin Americas export-oriented economy was imposed by violence at the time of conquest.