Testing a logic tree approach for archaeoseismology to the ancient city of Pınara (SW Turkey) Barıs ¸ Yerli a, * , Johan ten Veen b , Manuel Sintubin c a Institute for Geology, Mineralogy and Geophysics, Ruhr University, Universitätsstrasse 150, D-44801 Bochum, Germany b TNO Built Environment and Geosciences, P.O. Box 80015, 3508 TA, The Netherlands c Geodynamics & Geofluids Research Group, Department of Earth & Environmental Sciences, K.U. Leuven, Celestijnenlaan 200E, 3001 Leuven, Belgium article info Article history: Available online xxx abstract Geologists, seismologists, as well as archaeologists increasingly apply archaeoseismological investiga- tions to study possible natural causes of damage of a site and to assess the regional seismic hazard risks. Archaeoseismological investigations enable the obtaining of diverse data on past earthquakes and allow for an application of different methods. Furthermore, archaeoseismology provides the opportunity to study past earthquakes in regions where limited instrumental and historical data are available. Therefore, this approach contributes to a regional assessment of seismic hazard. The increasing application and importance of archaeoseismology requires a comprehensive and systematic approach. The logic tree methodology for archaeoseismology is an evaluation method which offers a standard procedure to identify and evaluate archaeoseismological information and to provide comparable values for seismic hazard assessment. This study tests the logic tree methodology for archaeoseismology to Pınara to assess the city’s potential to have recorded earthquakes, and the methodology’s value. The ancient city of Pınara (SW Turkey, 500 BCe900 AD) is situated in the Es ¸ en basin in the southern extremity of the seismically active Fethiye-Burdur fault zone. The present seismic quiescence of the Es ¸ en basin contradicts the geological and historical records which indicate that fault and earthquake activity must have been recurrent. With the application of the logic tree approach to Pınara, geological and archaeoseismological evidence of seismic activity is evaluated in six stages. The end solution of the logic tree provides a value between 0 and 1. This archaeological quality factor (AQF) reflects the reliability and relative significance of Pınara for archaeoseismological investigation and seismic hazard assessment respectively. Pınara’s preferred end solution (P es1 ) of 0.06 and the AQF of 0.12 are obtained by the logic tree method and reflect the high probability of recorded palaeoearthquakes in Pınara. In sum, the logic tree for archae- oseismology provides a concept with reliable criteria to assess the earthquake hypothesis in general, and the findings suggest the assumed low seismic hazard potential of this area needs serious reconsideration. Ó 2011 Elsevier Ltd and INQUA. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction Reliable archaeoseismological work needs an overall concept and a methodological approach that independently evaluates the archaeoseismological site potential. For this purpose, Sintubin and Stewart (2008) modified the logic tree formalism designed for palaeoseismology (Atakan et al., 2000) and formed a standardized semi-quantitative concept with six interpretative stages designed for archaeoseismological studies (Fig. 2). After every stage (n) a quality weight factor (QWF n ) can be defined on the basis of specific principles for that stage (see Appendix, Tables 1e6). At the end of six stages, the product of the QWF’s gives a probability of the preferred end solution (P es1 ) between 0 and 1. The first three stages focus on obtaining the site potential factor (SPF), which describes the potential of a site to record earthquake-related damage. The SPF is defined by the product of the QWF’s 1 to 3 and gives the preferred end solutions (P es1 ) of the first three stages. The last three stages focus on qualifying the onsite earthquake indicators of the ancient site under scrutiny. The final achievement of this logic tree method is to find the quality of the archaeoseismological analysis by calculating the so-called archaeoseismic quality factor (AQF) with a correction term (C) associated with the site confidence level (SCL) (see Appendix, Table 7). Primarily, the AQF ascertains the level of reliability related to abundance of archaeoseismological evidence and enables to appraise to what extent an ancient site has recorded an earthquake (Sintubin and Stewart, 2008). * Corresponding author. Fax: þ49 234 32 14571. E-mail address: baris.yerli@rub.de (B. Yerli). Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Quaternary International journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/quaint 1040-6182/$ e see front matter Ó 2011 Elsevier Ltd and INQUA. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.quaint.2011.01.037 Quaternary International xxx (2011) 1e13 Please cite this article inpress as: Yerli, B., et al., Testing a logic tree approach for archaeoseismology to the ancient city of Pınara (SW Turkey), Quaternary International (2011), doi:10.1016/j.quaint.2011.01.037