Physical Geography

Abstract

Physical geography seeks to describe and explain the natural world across space and time, for its intrinsic interest and human significance. Here, the changing nature of this theme is explored through time, from the first literate peoples, through classical Greek and Roman scholarship, early Islamic and Asian studies, European medieval and Renaissance time, the seventeenth‐century Scientific Revolution and eighteenth‐century Enlightenment, the agrarian and industrial revolutions of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, nineteenth‐century scholarship, and advances in science and technology from the twentieth century to the present. For each stage, scientific progress and selected leaders in the field (rarely called geographers but contributors to the field nonetheless) are viewed against the cultural milieu and technological assets of the time.