Paper short abstract:

This paper explores the role of the tactical model as simulacrum for military terrain that has the potential to be reimagined as a cultural landscape in miniature.

Paper long abstract:

This paper will consider the role of the tactical model as a manifestation of materiel culture. While ostensibly a tactical tool facilitating planning and preparation for military operations they may also embody multiple meanings. While many models are disposable products of a particular circumstance or situation some have enduring existences reflecting not only their primary function but a range of mutable meanings. Through the life of a model it may be an instructional tool but may, as a simulacrum of terrain, stand as a proxy for the actual landscape in a context beyond the purely functional. As such the model becomes not only a representation of terrain but also of the landscape itself encompassing a broad definition that includes cultural, political and social readings. Where models survive into the present day their meanings continue to be renegotiated and contested for they are truly landscapes in miniature and remain sites of conflict.

The paper will focus on two models associated with the 1917 Battle of Messines but will also consider other examples, including the great recreation of the Battle of Waterloo.