Synonyms
Cultural landscapes; Human-engineered cultural, social, and physical landscapes
Definition
The built environmentrefers to landscapes that are largely generated by people to sustain human activity. These settings include buildings, parks, and infrastructure facilities. They are viewed on a variety of scales ranging from neighborhoods to cities and surrounding municipalities that constitute “greater metropolitan areas.” The archaeology of the built environment refers to the performance of survey, testing, and more extensive excavation of cultural or heritage resources. In the current age of sustainability, archaeology undertaken in urban settings assumes increased significance because space is confined, and the nearly continuous development intrudes upon older historic resources that represent actual archives of urban growth. Such intrusions are lateral, vertical, or both, and they impose complex stratigraphic disturbances upon remains that possess inherent archaeological...
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Schuldenrein, J. (2017). Built Environment. In: Gilbert, A.S. (eds) Encyclopedia of Geoarchaeology. Encyclopedia of Earth Sciences Series. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4020-4409-0_140
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4020-4409-0_140
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