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Network of hollow ways and mounded sites dating to the LC and Bronze Age in the Khabur Triangle (KT). The numbered polygons represent the spatial extent of the archaeological surveys carried out in the area (see Table 1 for references)
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Scaling methods have been applied to study modern urban areas and how they create accelerated, feedback growth in some systems while efficient use in others. For ancient cities, results have shown that cities act as social reactors that lead to positive feedback growth in socioeconomic measures. In this paper, we assess the relationship between set...
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... In archaeology, simpler versions have been popular over a similar period (e.g. Hodder and Orton, 1976), with Rihll and Wilson later introducing a more sophisticated approach (1987 and related papers) that eventually inspired a spate of more recent work (Altaweel and Palmisano, 2019;Paliou and Bevan, 2016) including terrain-based path simulations (Bevan and Wilson, 2013). In this paper, we further develop an emphasis on road simulation via a focus on a well-known Chinese archaeological case, the location of the Qin-Han Dynasty Zhidao highway. ...
Modelling pathways or traffic flows on the basis of only partially-preserved or recovered evidence is of considerable interest to archaeologists. This study uses spatial interaction modelling to investigate the well-known Zhidao (直道) highway that was a major military road to the northern frontier in the Qin-Han Dynasty. The model simulates hypothetical flows among a set of known forts on China's north-western frontier and then compares the results to more and less certain attestations of the route of the Zhidao highway from archaeological and documentary evidence. We are able to reveal: (a) that logistical connectivity was unsurprisingly a priority along the Qin-Han frontier and (b) that the contemporary combination of forts and major east–west defensive walls were integrated via the location of the Zhidao highway. The approach presented here is reproducible via accompanying code and data, and could be transferred to a range of other archaeological applications where military installations, linear defensive works and highways interact in potentially complex and interesting ways.
... power. This principle of 'accelerated feedback growth' is known from other areas in the Near East (e.g., Altaweel & Palmisano, 2019). The measurable centrality of such places in terms of location along communication routes, for instance, for the transport of copper from mountains to coast, might potentially allow the role of this process to be assessed. ...
al‐Tikha is a mid to large Umm an‐Nar (c. 2700–2000 BC) settlement situated near Rustaq at the back of the Southern Batinah coastal plain in the Sultanate of Oman that was discovered (or rediscovered) in 2014. The site is unique because its layout and spatial organisation are very largely (possibly completely) visible on the surface. This includes two separate areas of stone‐built housing, a large pottery scatter of varying density, three or four typical Umm an‐Nar round towers and a small cemetery consisting of at least four tombs, along with a few other features. The layout of the site is described and discussed in detail, in particular, in relation to what it might tell us about the nature of Umm an‐Nar settlement and social organisation more generally. The location of the site within a pattern of repeating Umm an‐Nar settlement along Wadi Far (Wādī al‐Farʿī) is also described and discussed.
... In fact, Bettencourt et al. (2007) demonstrate a power law, superlinear relationship between many larger cities and multiple wealth and/or income indicators; this aspect can be tested here for the pre-AoE and AoE. In the application of this method to ancient settlements in the Americas, the Mediterranean and the Near East, power law relationships between infrastructure and urban population have been demonstrated (Altaweel and Palmisano 2019;Hanson et al. 2019;Lobo et al. 2020), though more work is needed to ascertain to what extent modern and ancient cities behave similarly. Nevertheless, previous urban scaling work, with more details given below, has shown not only that a formal relationship can be expected between a city's infrastructure and the total urban area, but it has also shown that this relationship can be ultimately connected to broader socio-economic phenomena, including wealth distribution (Ortman et al. 2015;Ortman et al. 2016). ...
... Urban scaling has been deployed in urban geography and related disciplines to analyse different built environments and social components found in cities and towns, including in the past and contemporary societies. In urban settings, scholars have analysed a broad range of social, cultural and economic phenomena (Altaweel and Palmisano 2019;Bettencourt et al. 2007;Lobo et al. 2013;Lobo et al. 2020;Schläpfer et al. 2014). These studies, conducted on both ancient and modern settings, have shown empirical power law relationships between infrastructures and urban sizes across a variety of temporal and geographic settings, with sometimes recurrent and somewhat regular patterns. ...
We present an approach comparing wealth inequality between c. 3000 BCE and 224 CE in the Near East using house sizes and urban area from 1060 houses in 98 archaeological sites. We divide this dataset into two chronological phases, firstly c. 3000-800 BCE and secondly 800 BCE - 224 CE. The first phase is characterised by small, relatively weak states, while the second phase is characterised by major empires and large states, termed as the Age of Empire (AoE). For these two periods, inequality is measured using house size in relation to settlement scaling, and applying, in addition, the Gini and Atkinson indices on house sizes. Results demonstrate that pre-AoE houses have a lower scaling metric (β) that measures house size relative to site size (0.24), while for the AoE the value is higher (0.41). This indicates more rapid median house size expansion during the AoE as cities grew larger. For the pre-AoE, Gini and Atkinson inequality measures result in 0.45 and 0.16, respectively, while the AoE demonstrates 0.54 and 0.24 for the same measures, respectively. This demonstrates greater house size inequality in the AoE. Overall, we see that wealth inequality is not only greater in the AoE, but that increased wealth inequality has a likely power law relationship to increased settlement area. Alternative metrics to minimise data biases affecting results, including median house size and bootstrap sampling, are applied to strengthen these results and overall conclusions.
... It is influenced by human factors and natural environmental factors. From the perspective of human factors, there are needs such as early natural worship, livelihood forms, external transportation, tribal inheritance, security and defence, group cognitive guidance, cultural integration and diffusion, and the emergence of rights organizations [24][25][26][50][51][52][53] . These demands reflect the spiritual and cultural pursuit of early human social life, which is a necessary condition for life pursuit and constitutes social and cultural preferences through adaptation to the supporting conditions of the natural environment and the transformation of the natural environment. ...
When studying the human settlement process, it is of great significance to understand the prehistoric environment, economy and society by exploring the human–land relationship and the evolution of civilization reflected by the settlement environment. This paper explores the natural and social environmental preferences of early human settlements in Xinjiang, China, from the Palaeolithic to the Bronze Age (45 ka BP–2250 a BP). Through the characteristics of settlement preferences, the distribution of settlements is accurately predicted, and the relationship between settlement preferences and the evolution of the environment and civilization is verified and discussed. We summarize the needs and conditions of early human settlement from the perspectives of the social environment and natural environment and explain the stages, consistency and differentiation of the spatial and temporal evolution of settlement preferences with the interaction of adaptation and transformation. On this basis, we discuss the logical focuses and content of early human settlement preference research. This research provides a reference for the process, representation, driving mode, and research ideas of early human settlement preferences.
... The urban scaling law has been a hot research topic for researchers interested in modern urbanism of how city growth affects the environment and society (Altaweel & Palmisano, 2019;Bettencourt et al., 2007;Lemoy & Caruso, 2020). For cities worldwide, the simple scaling law is a typical characterization method, suggesting that a universal organization and dynamics are at play in both infrastructural and socio-economic (Rybski et al., 2019). ...
... Therefore, scaling analysis has been a powerful tool to understand urban living based on the theory that population size is a key determinant of socio-economic activities in urban areas (Lobo et al., 2013). Several studies have demonstrated that the urban scaling law can also inform how population affects urban systems with complex social implications (e.g., transport networks) (Altaweel & Palmisano, 2019). Akuraju et al. (2020) inspected the association between country-wide sustainable development indicators and urban scaling exponents and suggested that the sustainable public transport system can be achieved by providing good service to cities. ...
The public transport system is considered as one of the most important subsystems in metropolises for achieving sustainability objectives by mediating resources and travel demand. Representing the various urban transport networks is crucial in understanding travel behavior and the function of the transport system. However, previous studies have ignored the coupling relationships between multi-mode transport networks and travel flows. To address this problem, we constructed a multilayer network to illustrate two modes of transport (bus and metro) by assigning weights of travel flow and efficiency. We explored the scaling of the public transport system to validate the multilayer network and offered new visions for transportation improvements by considering population. The proposed methodology was demonstrated by using public transport datasets of Shanghai, China. For both the bus network and multilayer network, the scaling of node degree versus Population were explored at 1 km * 1 km urban cells. The results suggested that in the multilayer network, the scaling relations between node degree and population can provide valuable insights into quantifying the integration between the public transport system and urban land use, which will benefit sustainable improvements to cities.
... While the knowledge that populations and resources show linear, sub-linear, and super-linear scaling relationships has been well known for some time for modern urban contexts [10], it has become clear that past urban systems have comparable scaling results for related urban phenomena [5,29]. Archaeological investigations focusing on population scaling relationships to urban phenomena have researched such topics as included: residential unit densities [30], the dimensions of mixing spaces, such as public spaces and street networks [9], city gate sizes [31], urban structures [32], inter-urban transport networks [33], social connectivity and material flows [34], economic returns [29], and labor activities [6]. Work has also demonstrated that population relationships appear to indicate scaling relationships to measured urban areas, where results have supported that throughout history socioeconomic networks have structured relationships to urban spaces [7,30]. ...
... We test if there is a systematic relationship between median centrality measures, recovered from street networks where data can be sufficiently reconstructed, and a proxy for population, specifically area measured in hectares. Conceptually, our approach is comparable to other urban infrastructure and population research for modern and ancient settings that demonstrate systematic relationships between infrastructure, resources, and population or population proxies [6,10,29,31,33,34,44,45]. The results help to offer a way to better estimate centrality in urban systems in the past, particularly as most ancient sites are only partially explored or unexplored, while outputs demonstrate insights into urban access and communication. ...
... As a result, although there is currently no formal expectation for the relationship between the centrality measures discussed below and the sizes of sites, one might expect the slopes, or exponents, of these relationships deviate from linear by about ⅓ or ⅙ and that organic and planned settlements will take on different values. This is because other urban infrastructure and related phenomena, such as city gates and regional road networks [31][32][33], have demonstrated such values. ...
Cities and towns have often developed infrastructure that enabled a variety of socio-economic interactions. Street networks within these urban settings provide key access to resources, neighborhoods, and cultural facilities. Studies on settlement scaling have also demonstrated that a variety of urban infrastructure and resources indicate clear population scaling relationships in both modern and ancient settings. This article presents an approach that investigates past street network centrality and its relationship to population scaling in urban contexts. Centrality results are compared statistically among different urban settings, which are categorized as orthogonal (i.e., planned) or self-organizing (i.e., organic) urban settings, with places having both characteristics classified as hybrid. Results demonstrate that street nodes have a power law relationship to urban area, where the number of nodes increases and node density decreases in a sub-linear manner for larger sites. Most median centrality values decrease in a negative sub-linear manner as sites are larger, with organic and hybrid urban sites’ centrality being generally less and diminishing more rapidly than orthogonal settings. Diminishing centrality shows comparability to modern urban systems, where larger urban districts may restrict overall interaction due to increasing transport costs over wider areas. Centrality results indicate that scaling results have multiples of approximately ⅙ or ⅓ that are comparable to other urban and road infrastructure, suggesting a potential relationship between different infrastructure features and population in urban centers. The results have implications for archaeological settlements where urban street plans are incomplete or undetermined, as it allows forecasts to be made on past urban sites’ street network centrality. Additionally, a tool to enable analysis of street networks and centrality is provided as part of the contribution.
... Archaeological research on the development of long-distance interconnections based on material and historical records boomed in the last decades (e.g., Bauer and Agbe-Davies, 2010; Brughmans et al., 2016;Hirth and Pillsbury, 2013;Kristiansen et al., 2018;Moreno Garcia, 2021). As a result, methods for analyzing material flows and detecting trade routes have greatly improved (Altaweel and Palmisano, 2019;Ibáñez et al., 2016;Barjamovic et al., 2019;Kennedy Thornton, 2011;Minc and Emberling, 2016;Artioli 2010;Martinón-Torres and Rehren 2008;Knappett, 2013), and network and quantitative approaches have been developed to integrate archaeological proxies, historical records, landscape features and geographical distance (Wilkinson, 2014;Knappett, 2013;Barjamovic et al., 2019;de Soto, 2019;Wilson, 2009;Izdebski et al., 2020). These innovations went together with the shift from a view seeing trade as an exogenous factor (Oka and Kusimba, 2008: 341) to one recognizing its endogeneity to economic incentives and its crucial impact on socio-economic and political development (among others, Massa and Palmisano, 2018b;Garfinkle, 2010;Benati and Guerriero, 2021a, b). ...
The focus of archaeologists on reconstructing exchange and communication networks in the past resulted in the enormous improvement of methods for analyzing material flows and detecting trade routes. However, our understanding of the determinants of trade patterns over time and space is still limited. To help tackle this issue, we study through regression analysis the rich economic and institutional experience of Bronze Age Greater Meso-potamia. Our testable predictions originate from three main economic theories of trade expansion. First, because of trade costs, mutually beneficial exchanges are discouraged by distance and encouraged by the relative size of markets. Second, trade expands when more suitable farming conditions in neighboring polities allow consumption risk-sharing. Finally, trade develops when interlocking exchange circuits ease the canalization of goods from the outside by providing secure routes, a more certain resolution of legal disputes and credit provision. Ordinary Least Squares-OLS-estimates based on data on 44 major Mesopotamian polities observed for each half-century between 3050 and 1750 BCE are consistent with these predictions. Our approach provides a robust theory-based empirical strategy for integrating archaeological, environmental, and historical data and calls for a tighter interdisciplinary cooperation.
... The study of demographic centralization and other types of population distributions via rank-size graphs (Adams 1981;Crumley 1976;Drennan and Peterson 2004;Johnson 1977Johnson , 1980Kowalewski 1982;Liu 1996;Paynter 1982;Pearson 1980) or site-size histograms (Duffy 2015;Fletcher 1986;Langebaek 1995aLangebaek , 2001Liu 1996;Wright and Johnson 1975) is inherently based on settlement size. So too is the study of community growth (Bandy 2004(Bandy , 2008, settlement scaling (Altaweel and Palmisano 2019;Crabtree et al. 2017;Ortman and Coffey 2017;Ortman et al. 2015Ortman et al. , 2016, community structure (Berrey 2013;Martín and Murillo 2014;Peterson and Drennan 2005), and more (e.g., Alden 1979). Though it is possible to carry out many types of spatial analyses using only the quantity and distribution of artifacts across a region (such as how those artifacts are distributed among different environmental zones, for example), this does not equate to regional settlement demography. ...
Shovel probes are a common form of archaeological data collection in densely vegetated landscapes. They were once the subject of critical analyses that evaluated their utility for archaeological survey, specifically the discovery of archaeological sites. In the decades that have passed since these classic studies were published, the objectives of regional survey have continued to evolve. Many archaeologists now recognize regional survey as a fundamentally demographic endeavor, one whose aim is to understand how many people lived where in a landscape during different periods of time. This recognition has placed greater demands on methods of regional data collection than those envisioned in the classic shovel probe literature. In addition to discovering prehistoric settlements, surveys must also reliably collect the full range of data that is needed for making the population estimates (be they relative or absolute) that lie at the heart of settlement demography. This paper evaluates the utility of shovel probes for studying regional settlement demography using the area and density of ceramic sherd scatters, a commonly used population proxy in numerous parts of the world. This evaluation is empirically grounded in analyses of data from the Intermediate Area (southern Central America and northern South America), the results of which are used to assess, and in some instances modify, regional survey results from the Middle Térraba Basin in southern Costa Rica.
... Population growth occupies a central role in public debate due to its implications for subsistence strategies, environmental change, and migration, and its relationship with exogenous factors such as climate variations. In the archaeological and anthropological debate, population has been identified as a driver for cultural change (Naroll, 1956;Carneiro, 1962) and an explanation for variation in subsistence strategies (Boserup, 1965;Binford 1968;Shennan 2000;Peregrine 2004), social complexity (Johnson and Earle 2000;Feinman 2011), socioeconomic outputs (Bettencourt et al., 2007;Ortman et al., 2014;Altaweel and Palmisano 2019; Smith 2019) and intra-group conflicts (Goldstone 1993;Kohler et al., 2009;Turchin and Nefedov 2009). More recently, interest in human-environment interactions has prompted an increasing number of studies investigating the impact of human population on landscape, including to what degree population fluctuations were affected by climatic shifts (Langgut et al., 2016;Lawrence et al., 2016;Kaniewski and Van Campo 2017;Bevan et al., 2019;Roberts et al., 2019;Stephens et al., 2019). ...
... Wilkinson et al., 2014;Lawrence and Wilkinson 2015). As a consequence, an abrupt deterioration of the climatic conditions of even a small magnitude could have had a great impact on the stability of communities and large urban centres reliant on intensive agricultural production to feed large populations (Weiss et al., 1993;Wilkinson 1997;Wilkinson et al., 2007;Ur 2010;Massa and Ş aho glu 2015;Schwartz 2017;Altaweel and Palmisano 2019;Cookson et al., 2019). A decline in precipitation at the end of the fifth-millennium cal. ...
This paper illustrates long-term trends in human population and climate from the Late Pleistocene to the Late Holocene (14,000–2500 cal. yr. BP) in order to assess to what degree climate change impacted human societies in the Near East. It draws on a large corpus of archaeo-demographic data, including anthropogenic radiocarbon dates (n = 10,653) and archaeological site survey (n = 22,533), and 16 hydro-climatic records from cave speleothems and lake sediments. Where possible, inferred population dynamics and climatic trends have been made spatially congruent, and their relationships have been statistically tested. Demographic proxies and palaeoclimatic records have been compared for the greater Near East as a whole and for seven major geo-cultural regions (Anatolia, Arabia, Cyprus, Iran, Levant, Mesopotamia, and South Caucasus). This approach allows us to identify regionalised patterns in population and climate trends. The results suggest a clear relationship between population and climate in the Late Pleistocene and Early Holocene (14,000–8326 cal. yr. BP) with population increasing in concomitance with wetter climatic conditions. During the Middle Holocene (8326-4200 cal. yr. BP) there is an increased regionalisation of demographic patterns, followed by marked interregional contrasts in the Late Holocene (4200-2500 cal. yr. BP). We identify a decoupling of demographic and climatic trends from the Middle Holocene onwards, and relate this to the existence of more complex societies. These were less vulnerable to gradual climatic shifts due to their logistical infrastructure, social organisation and technological capacity. We also assess the impact of five Rapid Climate Changes (RCC) which occurred during the study period on population levels. Although all five RCC (the so-called 10.2 k, 9.2 k, 8.2 k, 4.2 k, and 3.2 k cal. yr. BP events) are visible to some degree in our palaeoclimatic and demographic proxies, there are marked regional variations in magnitude and duration.
... Population growth occupies a central role in public debate due to its implications for subsistence strategies, environmental change, and migration, and its relationship with exogenous factors such as climate variations. In the archaeological and anthropological debate, population has been identified as a driver for cultural change (Naroll, 1956;Carneiro, 1962) and an explanation for variation in subsistence strategies (Boserup, 1965;Binford 1968;Shennan 2000;Peregrine 2004), social complexity (Johnson and Earle 2000;Feinman 2011), socioeconomic outputs (Bettencourt et al., 2007;Ortman et al., 2014;Altaweel and Palmisano 2019; Smith 2019) and intra-group conflicts (Goldstone 1993;Kohler et al., 2009;Turchin and Nefedov 2009). More recently, interest in human-environment interactions has prompted an increasing number of studies investigating the impact of human population on landscape, including to what degree population fluctuations were affected by climatic shifts (Langgut et al., 2016;Lawrence et al., 2016;Kaniewski and Van Campo 2017;Bevan et al., 2019;Roberts et al., 2019;Stephens et al., 2019). ...
... Wilkinson et al., 2014;Lawrence and Wilkinson 2015). As a consequence, an abrupt deterioration of the climatic conditions of even a small magnitude could have had a great impact on the stability of communities and large urban centres reliant on intensive agricultural production to feed large populations (Weiss et al., 1993;Wilkinson 1997;Wilkinson et al., 2007;Ur 2010;Massa and Ş aho glu 2015;Schwartz 2017;Altaweel and Palmisano 2019;Cookson et al., 2019). A decline in precipitation at the end of the fifth-millennium cal. ...
This paper illustrates long-term trends in human population and climate from the Late Pleistocene to the Late Holocene (14,000–2500 cal. yr. BP) in order to assess to what degree climate change impacted human societies in the Near East. It draws on a large corpus of archaeo-demographic data, including anthropogenic radiocarbon dates (n = 10,653) and archaeological site survey (n = 22,533), and 16 hydro-climatic records from cave speleothems and lake sediments. Where possible, inferred population dynamics and climatic trends have been made spatially congruent, and their relationships have been statistically tested. Demographic proxies and palaeoclimatic records have been compared for the greater Near East as a whole and for seven major geo-cultural regions (Anatolia, Arabia, Cyprus, Iran, Levant, Mesopotamia, and South Caucasus). This approach allows us to identify regionalised patterns in population and climate trends. The results suggest a clear relationship between population and climate in the Late Pleistocene and Early Holocene (14,000–8326 cal. yr. BP) with population increasing in concomitance with wetter climatic conditions. During the Middle Holocene (8326-4200 cal. yr. BP) there is an increased regionalisation of demographic patterns, followed by marked interregional contrasts in the Late Holocene (4200-2500 cal. yr. BP). We identify a decoupling of demographic and climatic trends from the Middle Holocene onwards, and relate this to the existence of more complex societies. These were less vulnerable to gradual climatic shifts due to their logistical infrastructure, social organisation and technological capacity. We also assess the impact of five Rapid Climate Changes (RCC) which occurred during the study period on population levels. Although all five RCC (the so-called 10.2 k, 9.2 k, 8.2 k, 4.2 k, and 3.2 k cal. yr. BP events) are visible to some degree in our palaeoclimatic and demographic proxies, there are marked regional variations in magnitude and duration.
