The safeguard of Cultural Heritage: a challenge from the past for the Europe of tomorrow

Proceedings of the COST Strategic Workshop, ‘Safeguard of Cultural Heritage: A Challenge from thePast for the Europe of Tomorrow’ held in Florence, Italy, from 11 to 13 July 2011. Plenary sessions on Strategies and Research Policies for European Cultural Heritage embraced the topic of future research and policy in the field of Cultural Heritage head on, with contributions from the Italian Ministry of Education, University and Research, the European Science Foundation (ESF), UNISCAPE, and COST Action representatives. Subsequent science and technology sessions on topics relevant to humanities and social sciences; information and communication technologies; natural sciences; architecture; economics; and tourism revealed the complexity of the challenge of safeguarding cultural heritage and the need to bridge the relevant research disciplines.