Archaeological Sites Distribution and Its Physical Environmental Settings between ca 260-2.2 ka BP in Guizhou, Southwest China

Guizhou province, located in Southwest China, is characterized by widely distributed karst topography, with an area of outcropped carbonate rocks of ca 10.9×10⁴ km², accounting for 61.9% of the total provincial area. Due to solubility of carbonate rocks, karst caves and sinkholes are widely developed in this area. Since the 1960s, a series of archaeological sites from the Paleolithic Age to the Shang-Zhou Dynasties have been found in this area. however, environmental archaeological study on evolution of human-environment interaction since the Paleolithic Age in this region has not been carried out.

Bearing this in mind, LI Kaifeng et al. analyzes the spatial-temporal distribution of 230 archaeological sites in Guizhou Province, Southwest China for three selected time periods from the Paleolithic Age to the Shang-Zhou Dynasties. The relationship between archaeological sites distribution and environmental changes is also discussed based on paleo-environmental proxies of δ¹⁸O and δ¹³C recorded in stalagmites from Southwest China.

The results show that in the Paleolithic Age (260–10 ka BP), archaeological sites were concentrated in the central, northwestern and southwestern parts of Guizhou, where the high-altitudinal karst landforms with many natural caves suitable for human habitation are developed. In the Neolithic Age (10–3.6 ka BP), most of human settlements were concentrated in the central, northwestern and southwestern parts, while, a fewer sites were found on river terraces in the southern and eastern parts, and the intermontane basins in the central and western Guizhou. During the Shang-Zhou Dynasties (3.6–2.2 ka BP), the sites were mainly distributed in the intermontane basins and on river terraces, which were suitable for primitive aerial farming.

The analysis of paleo-environmental proxies of δ¹⁸O and δ¹³C since 260 ka BP suggested that climate fluctuations had little impact on human settlements in this study area. The distinct physical environment, especially the spatial patterns of karst landforms and arable land played an important role in the archaeological sites distribution of Guizhou. The study was published in Journal of Geographical Sciences in June 2014.