Does the natural history of particular landscapes reveal their development potential? What can we learn from the past for managing these landscapes in the future - and in particular, what was the role of fire in forested ecosystems? These questions stand at the origin of pollen analysis and dendro-chronological studies, carried out in the Cantons of Grison and Ticino (Switzerland). - In the Swiss Alps, fire has been excluded as a landscape relevant factor. Century long land-use practices overrode natural disturbance regimes. Nevertheless, there is evidence for the potential of fire as a landscape relevant factor. Fire scars are found in many locations, within forests, on exposed topographic sites and towards the upper timberline. Yet, larger fires are seldom reported. Unless lateral or downhill winds occur, the rugged alpine topography does not favour downhill fire propagation, and forests 'thin out' towards the upper timberline, providing a discontinuous fuel bed. Further, population density is high. Hence, fires are likely to be reported soon after ignition. From a fuel's management point of view one can postulate that livestock grazing and logging practices have altered or reduced fuel composition and structure to the point where larger fires are simply not sustained. Today, however, subtle changes take place! Economic constraints reduce available management resources for forestry and agriculture. Timber value is low and the maintenance of steep mountain forests is labour-intensive, sometimes dangerous and costly. Traditional area-wide land use practices disappear and are replaced by either low intensity maintenance areas (e.g., forest conservation reserves, seasonal mountain pastures) or high intensity areas (e.g., protection forests, agricultural land close to homesteads). Already, an increase in fuels together with larger and more intense fires are observed in Ticino (Southern Swiss Alps), where rural land abandonment occurs. Such observations and the boreal-like species compositions of the forests of the Swiss National Park in the Engadine/Münstertal region (Grison, Southeastern Swiss Alps) triggered the question whether or not fire once played a more important role than recognized today. Our studies show that fire triggered the development of pioneer species like mountain pine Pinus montana ssp. arborea in the Engadine/Münstertal. In the Southern hilly regions (below 1000 m.a.s.l.) man used fire since the Neolithic as a landscape management tool, shifting tree species composition from mixed broad-leave deciduous forests rich in Abies alba towards oak forests. Fire suppression started with the introduction and cultivation of sweet chestnut (Castanea sativa) by the Romans. Pine species and chestnut are fire-tolerant and suggest that fire may become an issue when allowed building up fuels. When investigating recent fire history one of the biggest challenges is the distinction between natural and man-caused fires. Unlike in North American ecosystems human presence cannot be excluded anywhere. This study discusses the findings of long-term fire history investigations in the light of changing economic and ecological management requirements. It compares present fire and landscape management policies with the observed evolution of mountain forests and neighbouring grasslands and asks to which degree disturbances are needed to maintain 'balanced forests' on the long run.