Jean-Paul Bravard is Emeritus Professor of Geography at Lumière University Lyon 2 in France, as well as an honorary member of the Institut Universitaire de France. He has published numerous studies on the Rhône and other rivers.

• Foreword ixPreface xiIntroduction xvChapter 1 The Torrential Crisis in the European Mountains (14th–19th Centuries) 11.1 Introductory generalities on global fluvial systems 11.2 Manifestations of the LIA crisis in the river valleys of Western Europe 51.2.1 Mountain crises 51.2.2 River crises and metamorphoses of the Drac and the Isère in Grenoble 71.2.3 Flooded piedmont plains in Switzerland 111.2.4 Sedimentation and large works in Italy 121.3 The difficult mastery of the Rhine delta in the modern era 171.3.1 Flow distribution between river branches: an age-old battle against the elements of nature 171.3.2 Returns on destabilization 191.4 Observations on the torrentiality of the Southern Alps in the late 18th and 19th Centuries 201.4.1 A highly degraded state of affairs in the late 18th Century 201.4.2 Prefect Pierre-Henri Dugied’s project (1819) 231.4.3 Alexandre Surell, author of the French policy for restoring mountain territories 231.4.4 The restoration of mountain land (RTM) 281.4.5 The Southern Prealps (Drôme): what kind of balance in torrential milieus? 311.5 The sediment conveyor belt, from torrents to outlets 321.5.1 The forester Georges Fabre, from the Aigoual to the Gironde 321.5.2 The Rhône river trough 331.5.3 The redistribution of alluvia in the upper delta of the Rhône 351.5.4 Solid contributions to the Rhône outlet and progression of the Camargue delta 35Chapter 2 Continuity in European Hydraulic Science (16th–18th Centuries) 392.1 From hydraulic architecture to the fluvial system: transalpine preeminence 412.1.1 At the roots of European science 422.1.2 A great Italian scholar, Paolo Frisi 442.2 The first naturalist approaches to the water cycle in the Seine basin 502.2.1 Pierre Perrault 512.2.2 Edme Mariotte 522.2.3 French hydraulic science in the 18th Century 532.2.4 Emergence of the natural state of rivers in the mid-18th Century 592.2.5 Jean-Antoine Fabre, the great naturalist engineer of Southern Alpine torrents 622.3 Conclusion 67Chapter 3 Exploited Nature and the River’s Responses to the Globe’s Surface 693.1 Mistreated soil and accelerated erosion 713.1.1 The Huang-He (Yellow River) basin: accelerated erosion in a highly fragile milieu 713.1.2 Soil erosion in North America 773.1.3 Accelerated erosion on the Great Russian Plains, from Belarus to the Urals 833.1.4 New Zealand, “destruction on the pretext of development” 863.2 Mineral predation and river bursts 913.2.1 Lead and zinc in the Pennines: mines threatening dairy livestock 923.2.2 The “debris” from the gold-bearing alluvia of the Sierra Nevada (California) 933.2.3 The coal mines of the Loess Plateau, the Huang-He watershed 1003.2.4 Mountaintop mining in the Appalachians at the risk of downstream reaches 1013.3 Conclusion 104Chapter 4 From Hills to the Ocean: Production, Transfer and Trapping 1074.1 Global continental contributions to oceans 1074.1.1 Continental denudation and sediment flux to river mouths 1084.1.2 Natural sediment interception on the way to oceans 1124.1.3 Disturbances in “geological” fluxes during the Anthropocene 1174.2 Selected case studies on the Earth’s surface 1214.2.1 The Yangzi basin 1214.2.2 The sediment load of rivers in mountain regions subject to tropical cyclones 1214.2.3 The effects of the recent protection of degraded continental milieus 1224.2.4 Mining and the increase in river loads 1254.3 Irreversible flux disturbances 1264.3.1 The major role of artificial reservoirs 1264.3.2 Hydrological and sedimentary effects 1274.3.3 Trapping and effects on sediment transfer 1294.3.4 River diversion, loss of transport capacity and trapping 1314.3.5 Predation of river resources: sand and gravel 135Chapter 5 The Recent Hydrosedimentary History of Some of the Globe’s Largest Rivers 1455.1 A river in its natural state, the Amazon 1465.1.1 The river in its basin 1465.1.2 River function 1475.1.3 The threat of dams 1495.2 Adjusted rivers in China and Southeast Asia 1505.2.1 The Huang-He downstream of the Loess Plateau: contemporary generalities 1505.2.2 The Yangtze and the Three Gorges Dam 1555.2.3 The Mekong 1605.3 The Mississippi, an altered river in a new country 1665.3.1 Basin and hydrology 1665.3.2 Geology of the Mississippi basin 1675.3.3 Aspects of the river 1685.3.4 Modifications to the sedimentary budget 1705.4 Overexploited rivers in regions with a water deficit 1765.4.1 The God River and the Aswan Dams 1765.4.2 The Colorado River 182Conclusion 189Glossary 193Bibliography 199Index of Common Terms219Index of Places 223Index of Names 229