Editing Spring line settlement (section)

{{Short description|Settlements along a line of springs}}
{{single source|date=October 2024}}
'''Spring line settlements''' occur where a ridge of [[wiktionary:permeable|permeable]] rock lies over impermeable rock, resulting in a line of [[spring (hydrosphere)|springs]] along the contact between the two layers. Spring line (or springline) settlements will sometimes form around these springs, becoming villages.

In each case to build higher up the hill would have meant difficulties with water supply; to build lower would have taken the settlement further away from useful grazing land or nearer to the [[floodplain]].

Spring line villages are often the principal settlements in [[strip parish]]es, with long, narrow [[parish]] boundaries stretching up to the top of the ridge and down to the river but being narrow in the direction of adjacent spring line villages.<ref>Humphery-Smith (2003)</ref>