The degree of ‘planning’ in historical sites has been always dominated by measures of geometry and has, therefore, always oscillated between geometric, as ‘planned’, and organic, as ‘unplanned’. In this article, the spatial formation of four residential districts in three contemporaneous historical settlements, Mohenjo-Daro, Kahun and Ur, is examined to show that their patterns were governed not only by geometrical possibilities, but rather by certain needs of access and visibility. The article considers the application of Space Syntax methods to provide an evidence for the correspondences between the geometrical properties and certain considerations in each society, coming to the conclusion that the organic patterns of the site of Ur do not necessarily refer to lack of planning, but were possibly intended to meet certain defensive, social or climatic considerations.
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