Analele Universității din Craiova. Seria Geografie (Jan 2010)
EMM. DE MARTONNE’S WORK LA VALACHIE AND ITS INFLUENCE UPON THE ROMANIAN GEOGRAPHICAL SCHOOL
Abstract
The work La Valachie belongs to Emm. de Martonne’s early period, the author being the most prestigious geographer at global level in the first half of the 20th century. The book represents a synthetic treatise on a part of Romania, to which, besides the data suppliedby Romanian naturalists, the most important contribution is offered by the author himself through his direct field research, choosing and valorising the itineraries that were the most promising from the scientific viewpoint. At present, this work presents geographical andhistorical relevance at the same time. If the chapters on population and economy can help exploring the realities corresponding to more than a century ago, the physical geography part opened the road and the research directions for the generations of Romanian geographers ofthe last century. The French scholar is the first geographer to realize modern scientific studies in Romania and, directly knowing the Romanian space, he will proceed to the first division on regions of the southern Romanian relief, which is mostly admitted by the later researches.This article realises a review in a time arch with an opening of more than one hundred years,aiming to catch de Martonne’s influences on the evolution of the Romanian geography, with aspecial view on geomorphology, the final regional table emphasizing the present limits anddenominations of the relief units and subunits, where most of the registrations of the greatFrench geographer are confirmed.
