Topographic accessibility and proto-urban settlement organization in Neolithic China

Cities emerged from settlement systems that predated formal roads, mature states and institutionalized urban governance, but the large-scale spatial organization of these proto-urban systems is still poorly understood. Here we examine how terrain-derived accessibility related to settlement organization across Neolithic China between 5000 and 2000 BCE, combining a newly compiled georeferenced archeological dataset with a measure of overland accessibility derived from topography. Settlement intensity became increasingly concentrated along accessible corridors between 5000 and 2500 BCE. Between 2500 and 2000 BCE, this association weakened sharply, although spatial clustering remained strong and the principal concentration of settlements shifted toward intermediate-accessibility settings. These findings show that terrain accessibility structured proto-urban settlement organization before mature states and formal transport infrastructure, but that this relationship was historically contingent rather than fixed. They provide a long-run East Asian perspective on how the spatial foundations of urban development can be reorganized as settlement systems grow more complex.