| Abstract: |
Angkor, the medieval Khmer capital, was the largest pre-industrial, dispersed urban complex on Earth, covering about 1000 square kilometres at its largest extent in the twelfth to fourteenth centuries CE. The aim of the Greater Angkor Project is to identify the extent and spatial organisation of the city
to identify how the urban system functioned, especially the operation of the water management system
to identify the period and conditions of the demise of urbanism at Angkor
and to understand the factors, especially the ecological factors, involved in its demise. New estimates of the extent and duration of Angkor and new interpretations of its residence pattern and decline help to clarify the history of the city and to identify the operational limits of pre-industrial dispersed urbanism. Because Angkor was the largest pre-industrial low density city its extent and history are critical for an understanding of the how big such urban settlements could become, how long they could persist and what factors could bring about their decline.
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