What to Do with "Megasites" in Prehistory? Further Exploring the "Megasite" Conundrum

Periodically in the prehistory of human settlement very large sites have appeared which challenge our assumptions about settlement categories. Such sites, including Chaco Canyon, the Trypillia megasites, Bigo, Taosi and Co Loa, are often characterized as urban, proto-urban, pre-urban or not urban. However, even when making allowances for regional variation in urban form, these sites are anomalous. Roland Fletcher has argued that they might usefully be considered as examples of a unique trajectory of growth towards extensive dispersed settlement forms, complementary to but different from the trajectory of low-density agrarian urbanism and the recent trajectory towards dispersed industrial urbanism. A session at the SAA conference in 2013 explored the characteristics of some salient examples of these settlements, including the European Iron Age Oppida, Cahokia and Great Zimbabwe. This session will include additional regions and time periods, particularly in Africa, South America, the southwest USA and Asia and extend the discussion of how to theorize them. A consideration of these sites as comparable phenomena has the potential to transform our models of settlement growth, give new significance to regional culture histories, and perhaps have implications for our urban future.