Spatial Methods for Archaeological Flood Risk: The Case Study of the Neolithic Sites in the Apulia Region (Southern Italy)

Archaeological risk maps are very important both for archaeological research and for urban and territorial planning. Spatial analysis can help to improve existing methods at the local scale. In this paper spatial analysis, that is map algebra and point pattern analysis, are used, for an area characterized by several Neolithic Sites located in the Tavoliere di Puglia (Southern Italy), to 1) calculate the archaeological vulnerability with an improved predictive model that considers spatial autocorrelation together with environmental factors, 2) assess the flooding hazard with the use of morphometric indexes; that have been made spatially distributed in order to improve the effectiveness of results, 3) carry out an archaeological risk map for flooding that shows a high risk level for already known archaeological sites and areas with a high probability to find new sites.