Academic Article
Settlement patterns modelling through Boolean overlays of social and environmental variables
- Title
- Settlement patterns modelling through Boolean overlays of social and environmental variables
- Creator(s)
- Stan, Zoran
- Language
- eng
- Abstract
- Robust multivariate statistical methods frequently cannot be applied to model archaeological settlement distributions in contexts where the number of sites of certain types or periods is small. One alternative is to apply simple Boolean logic to combine variables that have been shown to have a bearing on settlement locations. This paper focuses on the modeling of archaeological settlement distributions through the use of simple Boolean overlays in GIS, a method that is by no means new. The sites investigated are a sample of Bronze Age hillforts from the island of Brac, in central Dalmatia, Croatia. What is new in this paper is that particular attention is paid to social variables as "predictors" of settlement location, a domain too frequently overlooked in modeling studies. A number of social variables are investigated and their importance is statistically tested. Of some importance, this paper does not sacrifice an environmental perspective at the same time, for multiple environmental correlates of settlement location are shown to exist as well. Consequently, this paper recognizes the importance of social and environmental domains to human location behavior and shows that models of high predictive power can only be achieved when variables from both domains are simultaneously considered.
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