So that they were near water. Also because of fish, and many animals they could hunt gather near water.
There are two reason why houses in the Amazon are built on stilts. The first is to keep water from flooding the huts and the second is to keep vermin out.
Junks
Near water
some people love the water life and the the boat houses ,also they just might like thee weather
The Mesopotamians built canals to protect houses from flooding and move water to their fields.:)
So they could have a water source.
Many of the most successful great early American civilizations built large cities along water. Typically these cities were built along the Atlantic Ocean.
Stilt house are usually built over water with a tidal rise and fall. The stilts keep the house above water.
The Middle Colonies: The Dutch homes were a bit different. Their houses were tall, narrow, and made of brick. They faced the water whenever possible, be it the sea or a canal built from the marshy rivers. The beds were built into the walls like cupboards.
Early Americans bathed using rivers, streams, and any other water they could find. In some houses, normally upper class houses they would have steel buckets for bathing and they could get in them, like bathtubs.
they used flood control. they built their houses on high ground so that the flood water would not destry their houses
Some did. The urban areas in several countries had established central water supplies in the early 1800s, replacing the individual cisterns, wells, and open streams that previously were used.