Geoarchaeology is a multidisciplinary field of study that applies the theories and techniques of the geosciences to archaeology. It draws on techniques and approaches from geomorphology, sedimentology, pedology, stratigraphy, and geochronology to interpret sediments, soils, and landforms in archaeological investigations to inform archaeological and chronological knowledge and thought. Geoarchaeologists study the natural physical processes that affect archaeological sites such as geomorphology, for example, and their effects on buried sites and artifacts post-deposition.

Geoarchaeologists' work frequently involves studying the soils and sediments of archaeological sites and the surrounding region to inform archaeological research. Geoarchaeologists also frequently use tools such as computer cartography, geographic information systems (GIS), and digital elevation models (DEM) in combination with disciplines from human and social sciences and earth sciences to inform their investigations and interpretations of sites.

Geoarchaeology is important because it informs archaeologists about the geology of the site, including the geomorphology of the soil and sediment. It also places artifacts and landforms present in the site into relative and absolute temporal context to better inform archaeological interpretations.

Geoarchaeology is considered a subfield of environmental archaeology because it utilizes similar concepts and techniques and applies them to address the same archaeological problems.

There are three main objectives in most kinds of geoarchaeological investigations:

Geoarchaeological concepts and techniques have been used in both geological and archaeological investigations since the 18th century. However, scientists began to use the methods and techniques of the geosciences to interpret the archaeological record more commonly in the middle of the 19th century.

The application of stratigraphic principles to archaeological sites stems from the work of Niels Stenson (aka Nicolas Steno) in 1669 and James Hutton in 1788. Stenson’s work developed and provided a basis for the principles of superposition and original horizontality, two of the core concepts in both geoarchaeology and archaeology. Hutton’s work led to significant conclusions in the 1850s about how old the human race is. Geoscience concepts continued to be applied to archaeological investigations in this way for the next few decades, until the early 1900s, when the application of these principles to archaeological sites became more refined with the addition of more specific field and lab techniques for studying past environmental conditions and material analysis.

Geoarchaeology, as we know it today, developed as a subfield of archaeology in the 1970s-1980s through the work of multidisciplinary teams applying geoscience field techniques to their studies. Innovations in dating technology in the 1940s enabled more accurate absolute dates to be obtained from many kinds of archaeological sites, which demonstrated the value of geoscience concepts and techniques to archaeology.