What can we learn about the ancient landscapes of our world, and how can those lessons improve our future in the landscapes that we all inhabit? Those questions are addressed in this book, through a practical framework of concepts and methods, combined with detailed case studies around the world. The chapters explore the range of physical and social attributes that have shaped and re-shaped our landscapes through time. International authors contributed the latest results of investigating ancient landscapes (or "palaeolandscapes") in diverse settings of tropical forests, deserts, river deltas, remote islands, coastal zones, and continental interiors. The case studies embrace a liberal approach of combining archaeological evidence with other avenues of research in earth sciences, biology, and social relations. Individually and in concert, the chapters offer new perspectives on what the world’s palaeolandscapes looked like, how people lived in these places, and how communities have engaged with long-term change in their natural and cultural environments though successive centuries and millennia. The lessons are paramount for building responsible strategies and policies today and into the future, noting that many of these issues from the past have gained more urgency today. This book reaches across archaeology, ecology, geography, and broader studies of human-environment relations that will appeal to general readers. Specialists and students in these fields will find extra value in the primary datasets and in the new ideas and perspectives. Furthermore, this book provides unique examples from the past, toward understanding the workings of sustainable landscape systems.

This book focuses on issues of method and interpretation in studies of submerged landscapes, concentrating on illustrations and case studies from around Europe with additional examples from other parts of the world. Such landscapes were once exposed as dry land during the low sea levels that prevailed during the glacial periods that occupied most of the past million years and provided extensive new territories for human exploitation. Their study today involves underwater investigation, using techniques and strategies which are clearly set out in these chapters. The underwater landscape provides a rich source of information about the archaeology of human settlement and long-term changes in environment, climate and sea-level. This book highlights how such information can be revealed and interpreted. The examples presented here and the focus on techniques make this book of worldwide relevance. Chapters describe examples of underwater archaeological investigation as well as collaboration with offshore industries and legal, management and training issues relating to underwater cultural heritage. Such studies point to the significance of this drowned landscape, and readers are invited to consider its human impact in terms of past settlement and population dispersal through palaeolandscape reconstruction and interpretation in relation to broader themes in human prehistory. This volume is based on work from COST Action SPLASHCOS, a four-year multi-disciplinary and multi-national research program supported by COST (European Cooperation in Science and Technology) and has something to benefit all those with an interest in the sea floor of the continental shelf and the archaeological and social impact of sea-level change, including archaeologists, marine scientists, geographers, cultural-heritage managers, commercial and governmental organisations, policy makers and interested members of the public.

This book focusses on new technologies and multi-method research designs in the field of modern archaeology, which increasingly crosses academic boundaries to investigate past human-environmental relationships and to reconstruct palaeolandscapes. It aims at establishing the concept of Digital Geoarcheology as a novel approach of interdisciplinary collaboration situated at the scientific interface between classical studies, geosciences and computer sciences. Among others, the book includes topics such as geographic information systems, spatiotemporal analysis, remote sensing applications, laser scanning, digital elevation models, geophysical prospecting, data fusion and 3D visualisation, categorized in four major sections. Each section is introduced by a general thematic overview and followed by case studies, which vividly illustrate the broad spectrum of potential applications and new research designs. Mutual fields of work and common technologies are identified and discussed from different scholarly perspectives. By stimulating knowledge transfer and fostering interdisciplinary collaboration, Digital Geoarchaeology helps generate valuable synergies and contributes to a better understanding of ancient landscapes along with their forming processes. Chapters 1, 2, 6, 8 and 14 are published open access under a CC BY 4.0 license at link.springer.com.

A scientific synthesis of 50 years of archaeological and palaeolandscape research on the prehistory of the Flevoland Polders, the Netherlands.

Research into the anthropogenic and taphonomic processes that affect the formation of maritime archaeological resources has grown significantly over the last decade in both theory and the analysis of specific sites and associated material culture. The addition of interdisciplinary inquiry, investigative techniques, and analytical modeling, from fields such as engineering, oceanography, and marine biology have increased our ability to trace the unique pathways through which archaeological sites progress from initial deposition to the present, yet can also link individual sites into an integrated socio-environmental maritime landscape. This edited volume presents a global perspective of current research in maritime archaeological landscape formation processes. In addition to “classically” considered submerged material culture and geography, or those that can be accessed by traditional underwater methodology, case studies include less-often considered sites and landscapes. These landscapes, for example, require archaeologists to use geophysical marine survey equipment to characterize extensive areas of the seafloor or go above the surface to access maritime archaeological resources that have received less scholarly attention.

This open access volume provides for the first time a comprehensive description and scientific evaluation of underwater archaeological finds referring to human occupation of the continental shelf around the coastlines of Europe and the Mediterranean when sea levels were lower than present. These are the largest body of underwater finds worldwide, amounting to over 2500 find spots, ranging from individual stone tools to underwater villages with unique conditions of preservation. The material reviewed here ranges in date from the Lower Palaeolithic period to the Bronze Age and covers 20 countries bordering all the major marine basins from the Atlantic coasts of Ireland and Norway to the Black Sea, and from the western Baltic to the eastern Mediterranean. The finds from each country are presented in their archaeological context, with information on the history of discovery, conditions of preservation and visibility, their relationship to regional changes in sea-level and coastal geomorphology, and the institutional arrangements for their investigation and protection. Editorial introductions summarise the findings from each of the major marine basins. There is also a final section with extensive discussion of the historical background and the legal and regulatory frameworks that inform the management of the underwater cultural heritage and collaboration between offshore industries, archaeologists and government agencies. The volume is based on the work of COST Action TD0902 SPLASHCOS, a multi-disciplinary and multi-national research network supported by the EU-funded COST organisation (European Cooperation in Science and Technology). The primary readership is research and professional archaeologists, marine and Quaternary scientists, cultural-heritage managers, commercial and governmental organisations, policy makers, and all those with an interest in the sea floor of the continental shelf and the human impact of changes in climate, sea-level and coastal geomorphology.

Landscapes have been fundamental to the human experience world-wide and throughout time, yet how did we as human beings evolve or co-evolve with our landscapes? By answering this question, we can understand our place in the complex, ever-changing world that we inhabit. This book guides readers on a journey through the concurrent processes of change in an integrated natural-cultural history of a landscape. While outlining the general principles for global application, a richly illustrated case is offered through the Mariana Islands in the northwest tropical Pacific and furthermore situated in a larger Asia-Pacific context for a full comprehension of landscape evolution at variable scales. The author examines what happened during the first time when human beings encountered the world’s Remote Oceanic environment in the Mariana Islands about 3500 years ago, followed by a continuous sequence of changing sea level, climate, water resources, forest composition, human population growth, and social dynamics. This book provides a high-resolution and long-term view of the complexities of landscape evolution that affect all of us today.