It's hard to get your head around just how different the geography of the UK was even just in the Victorian/Edwardian eras, and how rapidly it's changed.
Yes, we have very little left of the primary forest that predated human colonisation over much of the British Isles. Areas that we now perceive as wild countryside are usually anything but. One example is those moorland uplands which (in Scotland) were the result of enforced clearances [0] between 1750 and 1850 and which are now often optimised for grouse shooting. The New Forest, my closest national park, is essentially William the Conqueror's hunting estate and where land use and ownership been very tightly controlled since then.
Thus, any notion of a truly natural landscape of forest in the British Isles disappeared since long, long before the immediately pre-industrial era. Likewise applies for much of Europe even. Again, an example: the landscapes of modern Spain, France and Italy, were repeatedly cleared of forests during their history, particularly by the Roman Empire's needs.
Of course, on the other hand, you could also define natural to mean anything allowed to grow without human intervention for X number of centuries, in which case, yes, there have been many truly natural old growth forests in Europe well after Roman times, simply because they regrew during the hundreds of years between the fifth century and later, heavy population growth prior to the disastrous 14th century depopulation stemming from the Black Death and Great European Famine of the early 1300s (thought to have possibly been caused by a massive volcanic eruption somewhere else in the world)
Edit: The more I think of it the stone construction really is the most unnatural part. Especially the ancient tradition of building those little walls using the stones you cleared in order to plow.
While I'm not an expert - to my knowledge the land/resources were pretty thoroughly exploited and agricultural productivity wasn't exactly high. You'd have seen a lot of farm fields/pastures stretching across vast areas and things like that. Not that much "wild", unaltered/unworked land.
That depends on the country/area a lot though. UK is a bit of an exception because it's population increased much more than almost anywhere else in Medieval Europe but in much of France and other places some rural areas were possibly more densely populated even back in the 1200s (populations are much more concentrated these days while they were more spread out before the industrial revolution).
Even in England there are probably more forested areas these days than at any point since the 1400s or so.
e.g. https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/1536/cpsprodpb/144BD/productio...
https://www.layersoflondon.org/map/overlays/medieval-london-...
https://www.layersoflondon.org/map/overlays/tudor-map-1520
You have to click the checkbox "Use this overlay" to view them.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dissolution_of_the_monasteries
[1]: https://www.theguardian.com/education/2018/may/29/oxford-and...
[2]: https://www.theguardian.com/business/2009/oct/09/trinity-col...
[1] https://ephemeralnewyork.wordpress.com/tag/chrysler-building... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boston_Post_Road
A little while ago I was reading about Galois' death, and it's surprising how much* one can find online: maps taken near 1832 showing both that he didn't have to go far from the Latin Quarter to meet someone in a meadow at dawn, nor did the farmer who eventually brought him to the hospital (time recorded, ~9h30) have to travel far, either. One could probably even use a sunrise calculator to take the date and figure out an upper bound on how long he had been lying in the field.
(this upper bound should be reasonably tight: the point of duelling at dawn is to have it done with before the farmers get to their fields)
We're only missing the chat logs between ViveLaRépublique and Stephanie15 that might explain what he was doing out there in the first place...
* the coroner's report not only contains what we would consider relevant detail about abdominal trauma, but also contains a detailed examination of his brain and skull structure?
from: ViveLaRépublique @EvistePoly^5 #magicbulletcatchallenge
from: Stephanie15 @ViveLaRépublique oopsFAIL delete ur account
Addendum: too soon?I was already happy to have ISS street view: https://www.google.com/maps/space/iss/@29.5602853,-95.085391...
(exercises:
Find the ikon of Gagarin.
Is the speed limit sign accurate?)