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This article introduces the thematic issue of the Annales de géographie devoted to geoheritage, the abiotic component of the natural heritage. The article analyzes the conditions for the emergence of this recently recognized patrimonial field. It examines, from a geographical perspective, its capacity for territorialization. Through the double prism of the spatiality and the temporality of the geoheritage, it also questions their different registers of values (patrimonial, resourceful). Their socio-cultural and economic functions are also highlighted, showing in the end how geoheritage can access the status of territorial resource on which to base local development actions falling within the paradigm of sustainability. The five other articles of this thematic issue are introduced in the course of the article.