This paper presents an original approach to qualitative spatial representation and reasoning with topological relations based on the use of a Galois lattice of topological relations. This approach has been developed for qualitative spatial reasoning in the domain of agricultural landscape analysis. The paper describes first the general framework of topological relations, and then the design of a Galois lattice of topological relations. The elements of representation and reasoning based on this Galois lattice are discussed and examples are given, together with a brief description of the implementation of the Galois lattice within an object-based representation system.