With ever more inhibited programmes of excavation, new methods of site survey are always welcome. Here a soil geomorphologist joins forces with archaeologists to read the history of limestone blocks exposed on the surface at sites in southern Greece. Rillenkarren for example are vertical grooves caused by rainfall on stones that remained for long periods in the same place. These and other observations showed that what looked like clearance cairns had in fact been piled up in the Early Bronze Age and led in turn to the definition of a new type of settlement.