On Dec. 26, 2004, roiling tides as high as 100 feet rushed onto the shores of Aceh, the Indonesian province on the northwest tip of Sumatra.

An undersea earthquake had struck just off the coast and triggered a destructive tsunami, which hit shorelines all along the Indian Ocean as far away as Somalia. More than 160,000 people were killed in Aceh alone, and even more were displaced.

A similar tsunami appears to have wiped out coastal villages in Aceh more than 600 years ago, and the resulting devastation may have played a role in the rise of the powerful Aceh Sultanate, according to new evidence, published today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

In 2006, archaeologist Patrick