Abstract: Sandfield is an important type of rural landscape in China and it predominantly exists in the sea-land borders along the Pearl River Delta. Due to the unique water system and the lifestyles of those living along the water's edge, the traditional settlements in the Sandfield regions have developed unique spatial patterns that differ from those in Lingnan. In the current study, 810 traditional villages in the drainage basin of the Pearl River Delta were chosen based on the geographic information system (GIS) platform and analyzed from the perspectives of space type, space distribution and evolutionary processes based on the spatial distribution and historical data provided in satellite maps. 
　　Based on space morphology, it was found that the traditional settlements in the Sandfield regions can be divided into three types: distributed space, extending space and sheet-like space. With respect to the spatial distributions of the traditional settlements in the Sandfield regions, it was revealed the distributed settlements include some key areas and are located near the green island of the East China Sea on the north of Maning Watercourse in Foshan City. It was additionally revealed that extending settlements have relatively extensive distributions, basically cover most regions in Sandfield, and do not exhibit evident key areas. Sheet-like settlements exhibit some cores and they were found to be distributed near the border between Jiya Watercourse in Zhongshan City and Huashali Bridge. Among them, the extending type was found to account for more than 90 per cent and it plays the dominant role in the mainstream culture. Other types account for a small proportion.
　　Some progressive relationships were found among three types of morphological characteristics, where six obvious temporal evolution nodes and five spatial evolution layers (by superposition of spatial distribution information) were identified. Specifically, the temporal evolution nodes are: (1) Song and Yuan dynasties,  distributed type (A) of "ship houses"; (2) Ming Dynasty, belted extending type (B) of the boat settlements along rivers; (3) Qing Dynasty, extending type (B) of boathouse/riverside-grass housing settlements; (4) after liberation, extending type (B) of land settlements with river-and farmland-side grass houses; (5) 1960s, extending type (B) of land settlements under the “reconstruction of grass house into brick house” policy; and (6) 1990s, sheet-like (C) land settlements with a tide of waterside villas. The spatial evolution was found to include (1) overwater space, boat-water; (2) water-land space, farmland-waterside shack-boat water; (3) space along the water, farmland-grass house/Huangshao boat water; (4) waterside space, farmland-house and road-rivers; and (5) space away from the water, farmland-house road.
　　Three promotion mechanisms were found behind the settlement evolution in the Sandfield regions: the history geographic mechanism, fighting mechanism and differentiation mechanism. The history geographic mechanism represents the natural environmental basis for the formation of settlement in the Sandfield regions. The fighting mechanism represents the fight for survival that peoples in the Sandfield regions endured as a result of significant hardships in their pioneering work and their continual adaptation to nature and society. The differentiation mechanism refers to the process of continual differentiation between two unique cultural zoning systems: the Sandfields and farmland. Influenced by the three evolutionary mechanisms, the whole development process of the Sandfield regions exhibits remarkable ecological aesthetics and the values underpinning a survival ethos.

Key words: Pearl River Delta, Shatian, traditional settlement, spatial topology, evolution mechanisms

摘要： 沙田是我国一种重要的乡土景观类型。旨在揭示沙田地区传统聚落在历史变迁中的空间类型、空间分布与演进过程，为进一步保护与发展提供依据。借助地理信息系统平台，选取珠三角沙田地区典型传统聚落为样本，根据卫星地图提供的信息并结合历史资料进行分析与归纳。发现以空间形态作为分类标准，沙田传统聚落可划分为散布型空间、延伸型空间、片状型空间3种类型；其中，延伸型聚落分布最为广泛。此外，在政策、文化、经济等因素的多重影响下，沙田传统聚落随时间和空间两个维度持续演进。揭示了沙田文化景观形成的 3 个推动机制，分别为史地机制、斗争机制和异化机制。

关键词: 珠江三角洲, 沙田地区, 传统聚落, 聚落类型, 演进机制