Document Type

Honors Project

Publication Date

6-11-2026

Abstract

This study asks a fundamental question in archaeology: why do people consistently choose certain places to settle over others? Focusing on the Near East, it investigates how deep-time tectonic features, specifically fault systems, structure long-term settlement decisions by shaping water availability and ecological productivity. To address this, I integrate a large geospatial dataset of 1,023 archaeological sites with 9,075 mapped fault traces across 674 hydrological basins. Using statistics in R, I apply Poisson generalized linear models to test basin-level relationships between site density and fault density and conduct distance-to-fault analyses comparing archaeological sites to randomized controls. These analyses are further divided into pre- and post-agricultural periods to evaluate changes across subsistence transitions. Results show that archaeological sites are significantly closer to faults than expected by chance and that basins with higher fault densities contain more sites. These relationships persist across both subsistence regimes with no significant change in fault proximity before and after the adoption of agriculture. More broadly, the results demonstrate that human settlement systems are not solely products of cultural or economic changes but are deeply embedded within long-term geological processes that shape both the suitability of landscapes and human decision-making.

Level of Honors

magna cum laude

Department

Anthropology

Department

Geosciences

Advisor

Kurt Wilson

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