Abstract
The study focused on investigating human impact on the middle Elbe River architecture. The research included maps analyses (1841-2006) and historical Elbe canalisation documentation analyses (1907).
Furthermore, it involved description and comparison of soil cover at different transects in surroundings of town of Kostelec nad Labem (2013). Between years 1841 and 2006 a process of gradual, almost exclusively anthropogenic river course straightening took place in order to make the middle Elbe navigable and to eliminate the consequences of flood events.
Due to this almost solely anthropogenic influence different natural oxbow lakes were progressively filled in and disappeared and new anthropogenically created ones appeared contemporaneously. The landscape mosaic changed dramatically: meadows started to be systematically ploughed, small fields were unified into large fields, forest and urban areas expanded.
These factors have changed soil properties significantly: fluvic soil properties are vanishing, soil moisture regime is highly affected.