Abstract: Taking Haidai region as the study area, this paper analyzes the elevation, slope, slope direction, river system and other geographical factors of 9448 residential settlement sites in Pre-Qin Period (60~2.1ka B.P.), and explores the relationship between the spatial-temporal distribution of the sites and geographical environment, by collecting the residential settlement sites of Pre-Qin Period extensively and establishing a database of the region, combining with SRTM DEM data, and using ArcGIS 10.7 software. Results show that: (1) The development of human settlements in the Haidai area during the Pre-Qin period went through a historical process of elevation from high to low, terrain from mountainous to flat, spatial distribution from small to large, then decreasing and continuing to increase. (2) The spatial distribution characteristics of archaeological sites in different periods are basically consistent. Archaeological sites mainly distributed in the elevation range of 0-150 meters above sea level, with the range of 0-50 meters being the most concentrated and inclined towards undulating slopes of 2 ° ~ 15 °. The range from flat land to slopes within 15 ° is the most concentrated, and archaeological sites are concentrated in the slope direction range of flat land (-1 °) and southeast to southwest (112.5 ° ~ 247.5 °). (3)The daily human activity radius of Haidai region in Pre-Qin Period is about ranging from 3~4 kilometers, and the residential settlement sites are connected with the river closely. Overall, the geographical environment has a close influence on the distribution and changes of site locations across different periods, also reflecting that the spatial cognition and utilization of the geographical environment by the predecessors in the Haidai region during the Pre-Qin period were already at a relatively high level.

Key words: In Pre-Qin Period, Haidai region, sites, Geographical environment, Residential settlements