The impact of water resource availability on the Holocene cultural transition in the northwest of China

Abstract

This study analyzes the spatiotemporal distributions of 41462 archaeological sites in the Northwest of China collected from the Atlas of Chinese Cultural Relics publication and deduces the evolution of paleo water resource availability. Northwest China is rich in culture relics, and ancient anthropogenic activities in this region were sensitive to climate change and water resource availability. This study digitizes and analyzes all the archaeological sites recorded in two national surveys of the Holocene in Northwest China as a reliable material for studying the dynamics of water resource availability and the influences of water resource on cultural evolution and transition. The proxy of water resource availability is derived based on temporal variation curves of the different types of the total archaeological sites in Northwest China. This proxy is further validated with paleo-climatic proxies, and can be used to rebuild the change of paleo water resources availability in Northwest China. The curves derived from temporal variation of the altitude of total archaeological sites in this region have been also obtained as the proxies for paleo water resources dynamics. Based on these proxies, this study further discussed the relationship between paleo human activities and environmental change, deciphered the impact of natural environmental events on culture transition, and deduced the correlation between these proxies and the dynamics of ancient water resources.