Introduction
The women and men of this territory have always lived on the same resources, drawing from the rich nature to live and survive, mobilizing its resources and strengths to establish their industries, creating know-how, traditions and legends to live better together and in symbiosis with their land.
The territory of the Vosges du Nord-Pfälzerwald Transboundary Biosphere Reserve is not only rich in geological and heritage homogeneity. Its richness also comes from the meeting of the ocean and the continent's influences, creating a frontier territory of two climatic forces, whose environments and species, among the most remarkable in Europe, find their distribution limits. More than anywhere else, human history has imposed its breaks. From Celtic hordes to Roman legions, from medieval lords to modern emperors, all the conquerors fought and shared this land, between the Rhine and Moselle. The great European tragedies were written here until the Second World War, the deadliest.
The European idea was built on these ruins and nightmares. How to overcome borders without making war? It is not enough to turn the page on memories. We must also build a future, by recognizing and promoting what unites us: identical landscapes, common heritage resources, languages, cultures and traditions, a common vision of the challenges of the future.
All this establishes the Vosges du Nord-Pfälzerwald Transboundary Biosphere Reserve, a modest and valuable contribution to the great design of Europe and the erasing of an artificial border for the benefit of a restored nature.
On both sides of the border, it is indeed the same sandstone, the same streams, the same forest, sheltering similar natural environments and identical animal and plant species.
