When and Why did People Settle in Certain Areas?

In the past people have been settling in places where there was good climate and good topographic conditions. In the early history there were no countries, therefore people were free to move everywhere. People in the past were mostly living of farming and planting crops, so they choose a land with good, fertile soil and fresh green grass for sheep, cows, and other farming animals to graze. Good soil was also needed in order to grow crop plants such as wheat, sunflower, barley, corn etc. Since the soil is the most fertile in the flatland and plains, people mostly tended to settle in these type of areas. The people in mountains and high lands usually made terraces or cascades for planting.
I have learned that there are 3 categories of movement. Which are: temporary(for example: you go from home to school every day so you are daily having this kind of movement). The second kind is periodic movement, when you move to a new place but you stay only for a shorter period of time(for example: you go to the sea side for the whole summer holiday but afterwards you come back to your home). The third movement is called migration; this type of movement is migrating or moving from your home land to a new area where you will stay to live,(for example, people of northern India moved to Europe thousands years ago to find better life for themselves). People even today migrate, but mostly because of religious or political reasons. And in the future who knows? We might migrate to the Moon.