the early human occupation of high latitudes, boreal ... · the early human occupation of high...

NICOLAS ROLLAND1

THE EARLY HUMAN OCCUPATION OF HIGH LATITUDES, BOREAL, CONTINENTAL AND PERIGLACIAL HABITATS:

MIDDLE PALAEOLITHIC MILESTONESIN NORTHERN EURASIA

The fi rst “ice-age hunters”, living in an open landscape and hunting “cold” ani-mals (reindeer, mammoth) arrive in the Middle Palaeolithic. The settlement of the “cold” loess-steppe rich in animals requires a better mastery of environment (habitation, clothing) than life in a “warm” biotope.

(G. Bosinski 1982: 167)

...l’immense existence..., sur des dizaines de méridiens et sur plus de trente parallèles, de paléo-systèmes culturels, dont les dimensions quasi-décuples, la vitalité, la continuité et la cohésion évolutives peuvent progressivement imposer d’admettre qu’il s’agit bien là du dispositif central ou principal de manifestation et d’expression du paléolithique de l’hémisphère nord.

(D. Nat 1972: 210)

INTRODUCTION

In contrast with other primates, an outstanding characteristic of the human species since Early Pleistocene times has been a capacity to disperse and occupy a wide range of different biomes and ecosystems (Kummer 1971: 143–144). By the end of the Pleistocene ancient hominids had settled all of Africa and Eurasia, spread into the Americas, and colonized Western Oceania and Australasia by navigation. This rather unique geographic expansion illustrates ecological poly-morphism, as well as behavioural adaptability. Another major cause, however, remained intrinsically non-biological, namely relying on cultural means (techno-logical, societal, cognitive).

Peopling high latitudes and cold continental regions required overcoming signifi cant climatic barriers (Whiting et al. 1982) that depended on these cultural means. An omnivorous capacity for procuring food resources at different levels of

1 Department of Anthropology, University of Victoria, Canada; e-mail: [email protected].

ACTA UNIVERSITATIS WRATISLAVIENSIS No 3207Wrocław 2010Studia Archeologiczne XLI

2 Nicolas Rolland

the trophic pyramid, including greater reliance on a carnivorous diet, was another adaptive asset when colonizing higher latitudes in Eurasia under changing Pleis-tocene conditions. This event is discussed with reference to the Middle Palaeo-lithic record. The evidence is reviewed by stressing: (a) human biogeography that highlights a signifi cant linkage between Middle Palaeolithic cultural repertoires and the Mammoth-Steppe Biome, and its fl uctuating boundaries during the Pleis-tocene, as a natural infrastructure; (b) time perspectivism for observing ecological and cultural changes over time spans of suffi cient duration to show processes and trends. It is concluded that “the peopling of the North” had a considerably greater time depth than previously thought, and that the Middle Palaeolithic represented a signifi cant development threshold of this colonization event.

EARLIER OCCUPATION STAGES IN EURASIA

The earliest confi rmed fossil human and/or Palaeolithic evidence of the homi-nid colonization of Eurasia dates to the Early Pleistocene, though without consen-sus regarding a precise chronometric datum within 1.6–1.2 Ma. Key occurrences are represented by ‘Ubeidiya (Israel), Dmanisi (Transcaucasus), the Dina, Jalalpur and Pabbi Hills fi nds (Pakistan Siwaliks), the Nihewan Basin (North China), and the Mojokerto and Sangiran fossil humans (Java). Dmanisi and the Nihewan oc-currences represented the northernmost limits of that initial expansion, 44° N and ca. 40° N, respectively. In Europe, the oldest evidence comes from Atapuerca Gran Dolina, northern Spain (ca. 850 ka, 42° N), Pont-de-Lavaud, at the northern edge of the French Massif Central (>1.0 m [?], 45° N), and Pakefi eld, England (ca. 700 ka, 52° N).

All other evidence found above or near 50° N, like Miesenheim, Mauer, Box-grove, Abbeville, etc. are dateable to ca. 600–500 ka, and were occupied only dur-ing interglacials. Pont-de-Lavaud may coincide with a colder palaeoclimate (?), while in the southern France, the upper Mid-Pleistocene Baume-Bonne and Arago cave sites contain layers showing settlement during stadial conditions. Kärlich H base, Neuwied Basin, Germany, however, documents the fi rst bona fi de indication of a human occupation above 50° N in a dry steppe continental setting of Europe during the Mid-Pleistocene OIS 12 stadial, ca. 400 ka.

Information about the earliest hominid dispersals into mid-latitude conti-nental Eurasia above 50° N, namely southern Siberia, remains provisional, ten-tatively dated to the Mid-Pleistocene, ca. 430–300 ka (Kuzmin 2000). Palaeo-lithic evidence consists of pebble tools and fl akes occurrences: some possible artefacts from the Ulalinka and Karama quarry sites, Siberian Altai, Mokhovo I with a Tiraspol-like fauna, in the Ob’-Yenisei interfl uve (Derevianko 1998), Be-rezhekovo I, Kamenyi Log, during the warm Tobol’ interglacial (390–270 ka), Yenisei Basin (Drozdov et al. 1999), Diring Yuriakh, 71° N in Sakha (Yakutia), and Zasukhino, eastern Cis-Baikalia (Lbova 2002).

Middle Palaeolithic milestones in Northern Eurasia 3

ADAPTIVE CONSTRAINTS IN SETTLING HIGH LATITUDE, BOREAL, PERIGLACIAL, CONTINENTAL AND HYPERCONTINENTAL HABITATS

Ancient hominid groups had to overcome major natural obstacles before a viable colonization of Northern Eurasia could have become feasible. These constraints prevailed in high latitude boreal regions, even during mild or warmer interglacials (Clermont 1974; Zvelebil 1978: 207), as outlined in Table 1. Because hominids remained by phylogeny primate species of tropical African origin, they were not anatomically and physiologically equipped for coping with such climatic barriers without artifi cial, i.e. cultural means to resolve this “adaptation paradox”.

Table 1. An outline of adaptive constraints of boreal, periglacial, high latitude, and hypercontinental habitats

1. There were generally unstable and unpredictable environments threatening physical sur-vival.

2. Seasonal contrasts were sharp, with short summers, long cold winters and temperature ex-tremes dropping to between –40° and –60°, as well as rarefi ed oxygen supplies.

3. Winter daylight duration could have been reduced to 6 or 9 hours in January.4. Under latitudes 56°–72° N, photo periods became short, with severely reduced or halted

primary biomass production, and edible plants were scarce during winters.5. The lack of natural fur protection and insuffi cient thermoregulatory responses in humans

threatened their survival with hypothermia and freezing.6. Prolonged frost periods, extensive permafrost zones reduced access to or availability of run-

ning water.7. Thick snow cover, dense summer or winter fog, ice sheets and glaciers impeded human

mobility.8. Recurrent and often rapid Pleistocene bioclimatic fl uctuations or oscillations, lasting from

brief duration to lengthy episodes, forced human adaptive fl exibility and repeated shifts in land use strategies.

9. Acute food shortages or starvation were frequent risks during cold seasons that required in-creased year-round dependence on animal proteins from small and large land animals, fresh water aquatic animals and avifauna to insure an adequate intake of calories, dietary fats and proteins.

Key climatic and adaptive variables consisted in: (1) the boreal variable, de-fi ned by reference to south-north latitude gradients; (2) continentality, defi ned by meridian gradients, which in Eurasia increase from the west to the east; (3) Pleis-tocene bioclimatic fl uctuations, namely stadials and cold oscillations, interglacials and interstadial oscillations; (4) geological and geomorphological features like to-pography, substrata (limestone, volcanic, crystalline), soil properties and mineral contents; (5) biotic (plants, animals) characteristics and their potential as food or raw material resources.

4 Nicolas Rolland

HUMAN BIOGEOGRAPHY

The working concepts that constitute the human biogeographic perspective are as follows:

Culture. This refers to a hominid behaviour dimension involving operations by individuals and/or groups transforming the reality of events, objects, features or activities into their “human reality” by “interpreting” and “attributing mean-ing” (Santangelo 1995; 1998). This capability has a natural historical origin that began with the early Homo. It involved a long-term co-evolutionary feedback between behaviour and the cerebral cortex mantle. Culture is a holistic phenom-enon pervading human-habitat-animal-plant relationships, technology, economic and social organization, cognition and symbolic behaviour. It relaxed or modifi ed progressively natural selection of human life by creating a new “environment” or “margin” mediating nature and behaviour (Benoist 1965: 898–899). Researchers noted long ago that culture shared with domesticated animals, such as the “cultur-al protection” of animals that created an artifi cial environment screening against natural selection. Furthermore, J. F. Blumenbach (1752–1840) pointed out that hominids remained the only self-domesticating species.

Human Ecology. Quaternary research shows that Pleistocene environments, especially during stadials and interstadials, represented mosaic habitats bringing in closer proximity distinct microenvironments, whereas these tended to segre-gate spatially into separate zones during Post-Pleistocene times (Guthrie 2001). The pattern shifted in tandem with bioclimatic fl uctuations and correlated with greater biotic diversity (Roebroeks et al. 1992). This infl uenced greatly ancient foraging land use strategies. It favoured a wide-spectrum foraging strategy based on “residential and logistic mobility” in close relation to the structure of resources (Kelly 1983). Hominid hunters living in temperate and northern Eurasia began su-perimposing ecological specialization onto this basic adaptive substratum during the “Intermediate” (see Rolland 1999) and Middle Palaeolithic, by focusing on the exploitation of 2–3 medium and large ungulate species (Auguste 1996).

Palethnology. This concept comprises two distinct objectives. Firstly, it refers to an excavation philosophy and method in research design (Leroi-Gourhan 1966) that stressed the primacy of identifying, uncovering and recording ancient living surfaces, structures and other activity relicts. Secondly, it refers to the exploiting of the corpus of observations present in ethnological documents on recent and histori-cal foraging populations, particularly the so-called “marginal societies” in parts of North and South America, and Siberia. This valuable record remains without any equally reliable alternative analogies (see discussion by Narr 1962). It describes in detail the actual diversity and complexity of foraging lifestyles: constraints from climatic circumstances, seasonal and yearly variations in climate and subsistence


resources, human-animal-plant relationships, land use strategies, the role of social systems, and cognitive behaviour. That information can be applied legitimately to the modeling and constructing of a conceptual framework concerning ancient hominid life, culture historical processes, and formative stages (drawing also from Ethnological Theory, e.g. Sapir 1916). In the present case, this follows from iden-tifying fi rst the Middle Palaeolithic time-space distribution patterns.

Human Biogeography. The human biogeographic perspective introduces an observation unit which geographic scale transcends the limits of regional studies. It integrates in “stereoscopic vision” the natural habitats represented by the Pleis-tocene Mammoth-Steppe Biome (see below) spread throughout North Eurasia, and its geographic overlap with the extensive distribution of Middle Palaeolithic occurrences. They express together a vast cultural realm or oikumene (Nat 1972) that involved land use dynamics and social networks interaction across boreal, periglacial, continental latitudes and meridians.

THE MAMMOTH-STEPPE BIOME

An outstanding characteristic of the Palaeoarctic Trophic Zone of Eurasia and Beringia since the Mid-Pleistocene was the formation, cyclical expansion and contraction of the Mammoth-Steppe Biome (Guthrie 2001), or Mammuthus-Coe-lodonta faunal complex (Sher 1992; Kahlke 1999; Vereschagin and Baryschnikov 1991). This biogeographic phenomenon (see Fig. 1) emerged out of Central and Northeast Asia, triggered by orogenesis in Central Asia that had far-reaching repercussions on plant and animal communities until the end of the Pleistocene. During glacial maximums, the biome extended across Eurasia and into Eastern Beringia, from the Pyrenees foothills to the shores of the Mackenzie Basin in northern Canada.

Accumulating evidence indicates that the biome was dominated by xeric steppe grassland conditions (Guthrie 2001) underlying complex mosaics of highly productive alpine, steppe, tundra and taiga habitats that had few Holocene actu-alist counterparts (Guthrie 1985; 2001; Kienast et al. 2005). Seasonal gradients and contrasts were amplifi ed, especially during stadials, with severe winters and warm summers. The short warm seasons witnessed rapid, intense outbursts of biotic activity. This rich Pleistocene primary production supported an equally rich mammalian biodiversity. It included ungulates and carnivores like the woolly mammoth, woolly rhinoceros, horse, reindeer, moose, giant deer, bison, musk ox, saiga, cave lion, wolf, arctic fox, wolverine, lemmings, several of them widely distributed (see Kahlke 1999).

These predominantly xeric circumstances opened up several large, high lati-tude ice-free areas and ecological corridors, e.g. in Fennoscandia (Kurtén 1988; Ukkonen et al. 1999). A paramount example was the “Western Urals ecological

6 Nicolas Rolland

corridor”, stretching repeatedly between meridians 40° and 60° E. It covered about four million square kilometres during the Moscow Glacial (OIS 6) and fi ve million square kilometres during Valdai stadials (Nat 1971: 129). Similar patterns were replicated in much of northern Siberia (Kienast et al. 2005). The moist glaci-ated area edges also created rich primary biotic margins attracting ungulates.

The vast Mammoth-Steppe Biome offered diverse natural habitats for even-tual human exploitation. This remained contingent on Palaeolithic populations acquiring and elaborating over time a necessary corpus of knowledge, experience, land use and social strategies, technologies, familiarity with the behaviour, ecol-ogy, migratory patterns and demographic cycles of gregarious game species like woolly mammoth, reindeer, bison or horse. Woolly mammoths supplied abun-dant proteins and dietary fat from shoulder areas, e.g. at La Cotte de St. Brelade, Lynford, raw materials for artefacts and shelter structure elements (long bones, vertebras, tusks, teeth, hides, furs). Hominids were familiar with mammoth long-distance migration trails and feeding grounds, searching for minerals in solonetz landscapes (Derevianko et al. 2000: 52–53) and large limestone caves.

TIME PERSPECTIVISM

The time trajectory of human adaptation and culture history covers time span units of different duration. They may range from short-term events or “stochas-tic oscillations”, equivalent to one or few generations leaving few discernable archaeological traces, to long-term or longue durée patterns and trends that rep-

Table 2. Numbered list of major Middle Palaeolithic sites (sites are numbered in brackets, and plot-ted on the Fig. 1 geographic distribution map)

Western Europe(1) Mont-Dol; (2) Cotte St. Brelade L, 6.1, 3, B; (3) Crayford; (4) Lynford; (5) Beauvais-la-Jus-tice; (6) Savy N2; (7) Mesvin IV; (8) Scladina 5; (9) Achenheim III “sol 74”

Central Europe (10) Wannen; (11) Tönchesberg; (12) Schweinskopf; (13) Ariendorf; (14) Karstein; (15) Rhein-dahlen B3; (16) Salzgitter-Lebenstedt; (17) Lichtenberg; (18) Königsaue; (19) Markkleeberg

Eastern and Northeastern Europe(20) Dzierżysław; (21) Raj; (22) Okiennik; (23) Wylotne; (24) Zwoleń; (25) Chulatovo; (26) Rikhta; (27) Khotylevo; (28) Betovo; (29) Kvalynsk skullcap; (30) Dubovka; (31) Sukhaya Mechetka (Volgograd); (32) El’niki II; (33) Garchi I; (34) Peshchernyi Log; (35) Bol’shaiia Glukhaiia; (36) Ganichata; (37) Susiluola (“Wolf Cave”)

Siberia(38) Bogdanovka; (39) Bol’shoi Kemchug; (40) Aryshevskoe; (41) Okladnikov; (42) Denisova; (43) Ust’ Karakol; (44) Ust’ Kanskaiia; (45) Kara-Bom; (46) Kaminnaiia; (47) Tiumechin; (48) Ust’ Izhul’; (49) Mokhovo II: (50) Gora Igetei; (51) Kurtak IV; (52) Dvuglazka 5, 6, 7; (53) Kho-tyk 4,5; (54) Diring Yuriakh; (55) Mungharyma; (56) Osinovka


resented “time-averaging amalgamations”. The latter correspond with protracted developments spanning countless generations and approximating geological time units, more readily visible in the archaeological record. Time perspectivism means that “different time scales bring into focus different sorts of processes, requiring different concepts and different sorts of explanatory variables” (Bailey 1987: 7). It offers thus a suitable concept for discussing the long-term colonization trends in North Eurasia.

THE GEOGRAPHIC DISTRIBUTION OF MIDDLE PALAEOLITHIC OCCURRENCES ACROSS NORTHERN EURASIA

Figure 1 shows the distribution of Middle Palaeolithic occurrences across Northern Eurasia near or higher than 50° N and up to 64° N, superimposed over the realm covered by the Mammoth-Steppe Biome. Table 2 lists and identifi es each of these numbered occurrences. The time span covered by these Middle Palaeolithic occurrences ranges from ca. 300 to 30 ka. It overlaps with series of Pleistocene bio-climatic fl uctuations corresponding with later Mid- and earlier Late Pleistocene times (Fig. 2). The “Appendix” (see p. 29) outlines basic information, with key ref-erences to emphasize overlooked sites, newly discovered or re-investigated ones, and about which access to published information may prove problematic.

Although Middle Palaeolithic occurrences existing south of 50° N latitude in Eurasia, e.g. in Southern Europe, the Near East and Central Asia remain more

Fig. 1. Middle Palaeolithic Sites in Northern Eurasia. Refer to Table 2 for site names

8 Nicolas Rolland

numerous, the confi guration displayed on Fig. 1 demonstrates that Middle Palaeo-lithic populations began to settle higher latitudes and increasingly continental me-ridians since the late Mid-Pleistocene and early Late Pleistocene, under varying bio-climatic phases (Fig. 2). Figure 1, nevertheless, calls for comments:

1. Many Middle Palaeolithic occurrences result from recent discoveries or renewed investigations in Europe and Siberia. Most coincide with stadial circum-stances and show greater time depth than previously thought;

2. This suggests that prospects of further discoveries look promising. Re-search in higher latitudes, nevertheless, faces logistical challenges: short summer fi eldwork seasons; huge distances (especially east of meridian 35° E); transporta-tion problems due to the scarcity of roads or railways; accessing sites buried under massive silt or loess overburdens; laborious excavations in permafrost or wa -terlogged deposits;

3. Most Palaeolithic occurrences from the “Western Urals ecological cor-ridor” remain known only from surveys conducted during few excavations since the 1930s; Upper Palaeolithic occurrences in that region outnumber Middle Pal-aeolithic ones. These became largely inaccessible because they have been water-logged since the fl ooding caused by the Kama hydraulic reservoir;

Fig 2. Human occupations in the Palaeolithic – Correlation of latitudes with Pleistocene fl uctuations (OIS) and Palaeolithic time subdivisions


4. Field research in Siberia has a long and productive history, but was con-fi ned mainly to major inhabited areas in south-central Siberia (see Derevianko 1998, Fig. 204), along major north-fl owing fl uvial systems originating deep into the northern slopes of Central Asian mountains (Sayans, Altai).

DISCUSSION

ADAPTIVE TIME SERIES

Figure 2 correlates latitudes with Pleistocene fl uctuations, labelled “oxygen isotopic stages” (OIS), and with Palaeolithic subdivisions, namely: (a) the In-termediate, bridging the Lower and Middle Palaeolithic, (b) the Middle and (c) Upper Palaeolithic. They highlight a time series trajectory displaying a twofold pattern: (1) a succession of south to north latitudes occupation cycles that tend to co-vary with Pleistocene interglacial, stadial, and interstadial alternations; (2) an underlying cumulative trend toward occupying progressively higher latitudes that becomes more pronounced in the Middle Palaeolithic and culminates during the Upper Palaeolithic.

LATITUDE GRADIENTS AND BIOCLIMATIC FLUCTUATIONS

In Europe, except for the probably discrete precocious occupation episo de of Kärlich H base during OIS 12 (50° N), the earliest recurrent examples of ho-minid occupation during stadials begin with the emergence of the fi rst Middle Palaeolithic occurrences during OIS 8 (297–250 ka) in West-Central or Central Europe (Mesvin IV, Ariendorf I, Markkleeberg). During cold oscillations of the OIS 7 interglacial, the Crayford brickearth contains evidence of human butchering activities associated with a faunal complex comprising several Mammoth-Steppe Biome species.

Occupation evidence above or near 50° N during the Saalian periglacial (OIS 6) is shown by many new sites in Europe (Bosinski 1982; 1986; Callow and Cornford 1986: 385; Foltyn et al. 2000; Thieme 2003; Turner 1990): Cotte St. Brelade B, 3, 6; Maison-Alfort; Beauvais-La-Justice; Achenheim III “sol 74”; the Schweinskopf, Tönchesberg, Wannen group; Rheindahlen B; Ochtmissen; Dzierżysław. During the Eemian period (OIS 5e), Susiluola (“Wolf Cave”) tes-tifi es that human occupation reached far north, Western Ostrobothnia, Finland, 62.2° N (Mahaney et al. 2001; Schultz et al. 2002).

The Scladina Cave (layer 5) was occupied during the Saint-Germain 1B cold oscillation, or OIS 5a–d (Otte et al. 1998). An Early Weichsel cold oscil-lation and cold steppe-tundra fauna is evidenced at Salzgitter-Lebenstedt. Cold stadial occupation sites associated with the Mammoth-Steppe Biome fauna are found in Northwest and Central Europe during various oscillations of the OIS 4

10 Nicolas Rolland

stadial (Early Weichsel glacial): Lynford; Mont-Dol; Cotte St. Brelade 11; Savy; Karstein; Lichtenberg; Zwoleń.

Middle Palaeolithic occurrences during stadials are also associated with the Mammoth-Steppe Biome fauna below 50° N latitude, e.g. in Central Europe, Érd, Tata, Kůlna, Nietoperzowa, Vergisson IV (95% of remains were identifi ed as rein-deer), eastern France, the Combe-Grenal late Riss and Early Wurm horizons, at La Chaise (late Riss), Aquitaine Basin, with abundant reindeer, horse, bison and saiga, during maximum Mammoth-Steppe Biome expansions.

CONTINENTALITY AND HYPERCONTINENTALITY

The progressive conquest of Northern Eurasia included the eastern Russian Plain, the Western Urals, and Siberia. Humans occupied increasingly continental and hyper-continental longitudes and habitats that mark the transition from the West-European paraperiglacial cold-temperate zone to the East-European para-periglacial polar-temperate zone (see Velichko 1988, Fig. 8), shown by Khoty-levo, Betovo, Rikhta, Dubovka, Sukhaiia Mechetka during the OIS 5a–d cold oscillations and/or the Early Valdai, near or above 50° N. The age of the Kvalynsk skullcap (Gremiiatskii 1952) at 53° N, in the Volga remains unknown, but its archaic morphology implies an early date (OIS 7 or OIS 5e). Middle Palaeo-lithic fi nds in the Western Urals probably correspond with the Livkhin interglacial (OIS 7) at Elniki II, and early OIS 3 at Garchi I, Bol’shoi Glukhoi, Peshchernyi Log (Guslitzer and Pavlov 1987; 1993; Pavlov et al. 2004; Talitskii 1946) under continental mesic conditions at 58–59° N latitudes.

Settling the Siberian continental longitudes required coping with cold dry win-ter extremes, even in mid-latitudes. Present-day winter temperatures may drop to –33°C or lower in parts of the Altai, –26°C in mesic Baikalia, –56°C in the upper Yenisei area of south-central Siberia, and under –60°C in Yakutia. Winter condi-tions become especially severe in open northern steppes. Notwithstanding these circumstances, evidence from Siberia, where ice-free corridors were common, con-fi rms a human occupation of continental and hypercontinental habitats associated with the Mammoth-Steppe Biome faunal suite above 50° N: Bogdanovka, at the Eastern Ural edge (Shirokov 1992); Ust’ Izhul’, Yenisei Basin, during the Kazant-sevo interglacial (Chlachula et al. 2003; Drozdov et al. 1999); Siberian Altai caves and open-air sites, e.g. Denisova, Ust’Kanskaiia, Kaminnaiia, Ust’ Karakol, during the Kazantsevo interglacial, Zyriian (OIS 4) stadial and Karginsk interstadial (Der-evianko 1998; Derevianko et al. 2003). The Okladnikov Cave was occupied during The Karginsk (Derevianko and Markin 1992). Kurtak 11, Yenisei, may represent a Zyrian stadial disturbed occurrence (Drozdov et al. 1999). The northernmost Middle Palaeolithic site is Mungharyma, Yakutia (Sakha), 64° N, perhaps early OIS 3 (Mochanov and Fedoseeva 2001; 2003), though under hypercontinental xeric cold conditions. Dating the earliest Diring Yuriakh quarry site horizon, Yakutia, 61° N, remains inconclusive (Derevianko 1998; Kuzmin 2000). It may represent a discrete northern penetration during a late Mid-Pleistocene interglacial.


DISPERSAL MILESTONES

The cyclical, though progressive hominid occupation of Northern Eurasia likely involved south-north, rather than west-east, movements, since Central Asia, Mongolia, North China, besides Europe and the Near East, were also settled during the Lower Palaeolithic. Northward population movements beyond 40° N latitudes formed fl uctuating dispersal frontlines undulating along latitudes and meridian axes. Although initially in tandem with Pleistocene temperate phases, they established afterwards a progressive succession of adaptive and habitats oc-cupation milestones even during boreal, periglacial and xeric continental phases. Throughout North Eurasia, we witness a close association with the Mammoth-Steppe Biome faunal suite that supplied animal food staples, woolly mammoth particularly, from Lynford or Cotte St. Brelade to Ust’Izhul’ or Mungharyma.

Examples of land use milestones in Europe come from (1) the English Channel during stadial phases, and (2) Western Ostrobothnia, Finland, during the Eemian interglacial. During the glacial, eustatic sea level stood low, the Channel became a land bridge incised by palaeo-rivers (Tuffreau and Marcy 1998: 4, cover picture and Fig. 1) and was covered by steppe-tundra. During severe winters (–40°C in January), it became hunting ground, in place of the present-day fi shing grounds. The cliffs bordering the Channel contain Middle Palaeolithic sites clustered along the Normandy and Brittany coastlines, and Jersey Island (Callow and Cornford 1986; Monnier 1980, Figs. 230, 235) suggesting preferred locations to monitor herd movements along the Channel steppe-tundra. The intriguing Eemian (OIS 5e) occurrence of Susiluola (“Wolf Cave”), western Finland, represents a dif-ferent milestone situation (Schultz et al. 2002). The geology, palaeoclimatology and palinology indicate a comparatively brief boreal “window of opportunity” occupation episode during the Eemian interglacial – though with the persistence of mammoth and reindeer Mammoth-Steppe Biome elements in ice-free areas of Fennoscandia (Hütt et al. 1993; Kurtén 1988; Mahaney et al. 2001; Ukkonen et al. 1999).

HOMINID BEHAVIOURAL ECOLOGY AND BIOGEOGRAPHY

Modeling the adaptive processes and land use, revealed by the overlap of the Mammoth-Steppe Biome and Middle Palaeolithic occurrences throughout north-ern Eurasia, must consider interacting factors. Firstly, human groups colonizing boreal, high latitude, periglacial and continental environments had to come to terms with challenging perennial and/or cyclical bio-climatic stresses and im-peratives, to insure survival. Secondly, while Quaternary research shows that such Pleistocene habitats were not “desolate landscapes”, exploiting their latent subsistence potential made it incumbent to develop a core of essential, targeted strategies in technology, socio-ecology, organization and cognition, if adjustment to these circumstances was to be feasible. The ethnographic record on various life

12 Nicolas Rolland

style aspects of foraging societies in boreal/subarctic regions of North America and Siberia provides valuable descriptive information about basic requirements and constraints to insure year-round survival, albeit taking into consideration that Middle Palaeolithic cultural repertoires remained at a simpler and more rudimen-tary level.

MATERIAL CULTURE REPERTOIRES

These included categories of portable artefacts and artifi cial structure tech-nologies already developed in other areas or since the Lower and Intermediate Palaeolithic:

Lithic technology (see Rolland 1999, Table 1), as well as bone, antler and wood artefacts for procurement and maintenance;

Fire making, essential to avoid hypothermia, provide heating, light during dark hours, food cooking, keep carnivores at bay, and for bush burning. It was already necessary (despite a lack of preserved evidence) during the Lower Palaeo-lithic settling of Northern Europe, e.g. Pakefi eld, Boxgrove, Abbeville, Misen-heim. Its uses broadened during the Middle Palaeolithic;

Artifi cial dwelling structures like screens, tents, dugouts and huts (Rolland 1999, Table 3B; see also the discovery of a camp with huts at Inden-Altdorf, Rhineland, dateable to the Eemian period, “Steinzeit-Werkzeuge im Tagebau”, Kölner Stadt Anzeiger 05.02.07), apart from using available caves or rock-shelters. Inorganic (rocks, slabs, clay, sand, gravel) and organic (moss, lichen, grass, leaves, bark, vines, furs, hides, sinews, large bones, tusks, antlers, animal grease) raw materials could serve for making protective structures against win-ter cold and wind, as well as clothing, though, again, preserved traces remain scarce.

Animal food procurement techniques involved simple and more elaborate techniques (Anell 1969) such as fi re, weapons, corralling, driving, trapping, pur-suing by stealth, according to game animal behavioural ecology, feeding habits, and size. During winters, game herd species like bison or mammoth aggregated in sheltered river valleys, where they could have been hunted more readily. This is documented by ethnographic fi ndings and/or indicated by the location of Middle Palaeolithic sites.

SOCIAL ECOLOGY, LAND USE REPERTOIRES AND SOCIAL SYSTEMS

Subsistence conditions in boreal, periglacial, continental and hyperconti-nental circumstances were governed by several requirements: a dependence on animal food resources for the most of the year; increasingly specialized exploi-tation of gregarious ungulates – their availability was controlled by seasonal variations, mobility patterns and migrations, demographic cycles and the fact


that these species were scattered across boreal, subarctic, steppe, tundra and alpine habitats; human mobility (Kelly 1983) across vast distances, which was necessary for “mapping in”, procurement of dispersed food resources and ac-quisition of raw materials; adjustment by closely attuned time-space scheduling “calendars” to sharp variations in climate, resources, seasonality, yearly cycles, and landscape impediments (ice fi elds, bogs, marshes, muskegs, lakes, hills and mountain ranges).

Extensive home ranges expressed a complex relationship between space, distance and mobility within them. The social systems most compatible with such constraints would favour low density, dispersed local groups with a fl uid composi-tion of nuclear families, individuals’ residences’ “fl ux”, and fi ssion. These open, “anucleated” social units (Yellen and Harpending 1972) would be linked through “mating networks” (Wobst 1976). Wide kin networks insured local group bio-logical continuity by maintaining minimum demographic thresholds and mitigate stochastic variations in population size.

COGNITIVE AND INFORMATION STRATEGIES

Besides basic technological, socio-ecological, social and organizational methods to meet survival demands throughout the vast cold spaces of North Eurasia, sparse mobile foraging populations had to depend on long-distance in-formation sharing networks, directly by contacts and indirectly through diffu-sion continua. This critical cultural strategy entailed three conditions: acquiring and pooling over generations knowledge about landscape, habitats, bioclimatic change, localized and seasonal variations in plant and animal food resources, be-haviour, migrations and fl uctuation cycles; sharing available information reliably between small, dispersed local populations; devising social and symbolic methods to transmit this information.

The “fi rst immigrants” moving into new ecosystems by home range displace-ments, salients and shifting frontlines along latitudes and meridians, had to probe unfamiliar ecosystems by trial-and-error feedback loops. Information repertoires were acquired slowly and accumulated over many generations. The mobility and “interaction spheres” necessary for surviving in boreal, periglacial and continental settings fostered these socially fl exible anucleated kinship systems and mating networks insuring local groups’ demographic maintenance. It served the addition-al purpose of circulating and exchanging pooled information and new techniques. Oral traditions provided a sine qua non means developed across generations for passing on vital information by new signals and symbolized communication (Clermont 1974; Cooper 1946; Minc 1986).

The widespread distribution of Middle Palaeolithic sites shown on Fig. 1 testifi es that archaic modern populations already mastered the essential lifestyle strategies and cultural means that made possible a viable colonization of these

14 Nicolas Rolland

landscapes and habitats of North Eurasia. This distribution pattern across the North Eurasian geographic magnitude evokes the picture of a “Christmas tree” shining in the dark. Its “lights fl ashing in and out” refl ect the “wiring” connect-ing these archaeological signatures of past interaction networks, of home range displacements, dispersal frontlines oscillations, left by successive generations of loosely linked local groups’ fi ssion.

THE MIDDLE PALAEOLITHIC AS A FORMATIVE STAGE

The Pleistocene peopling of the North took place as a longue durée time series, beginning with the Middle Palaeolithic as a formative stage. Hominid eco-logical plasticity and a series of “apprenticeship” strategies and thresholds, largely dependent on culture means, made that possible (Bosinski 1982; Kummer 1971; Nat 1971; Rolland 1999). Some of these means were elaborated during the Lower Palaeolithic, prior to dispersals further north and major land use adjustments. An omnivorous dietary repertoires broadened and became more specialized by Mid-dle Palaeolithic times, with a focus on animal food. Penetrating northern Eurasian latitudes and habitats reached an apogee in the Upper Palaeolithic (Fig. 2). Set-tlements up to and above the Arctic Circle, under varying climatic conditions, are exemplifi ed by a string of occurrences during the OIS 3 Main Interstadial and OIS 2 Main Stadial, from Northeast Europe to Eastern Beringia, beginning be-tween 50 and 30 ka. Outstanding new discoveries include: Mamontovaiia Kuriia, 65° N (Northeast European Urals), 36 ka; Yana RHS, 71° N (Yakutia), 27 ka; Bluefi sh Cave, 67° N (Yukon), 24 ka.

The Upper Palaeolithic in North Eurasia represents the “classic” devel-opment stage, rooted in Middle Palaeolithic antecedents. The “transitional” character of the most of Early Upper Palaeolithic assemblage types in Western Eurasia, up to Trans-Baikalia, suggests self-contained multilinear homotaxial process incorporating new, more elaborate and more organized cultural ele-ments fostered by extensive interaction spheres and diffusion continua. The record does not support the scenario of a sudden, total and qualitatively distinct replacement event the origin of which was external and monocentric, e.g. Near East or Sub-Saharan Africa (?), triggered by biological or neural-anatomical “prime movers”.

CONCLUSION

The survey, concerned with Middle Palaeolithic occurrences over North Eur-asia, reveals a signifi cant linkage between their distribution and the Pleistocene Mammoth-Steppe Biome. This connection (see Bosinski 1963) is buttressed by


mounting evidence. A viable stadial occupation above 50° N is established, for instance, by small, discrete occurrences in the Neuwied Basin (Bosinski 1986). The patterns shown by the survey owe much to improved analytical power in archaeology, and rich information contents from Quaternary research. The con-clusions, interpretative hypotheses and the culture historical framework rest on two major observation sources: (1) the Middle Palaeolithic record distributed over latitudinal, longitudinal, time-climatic and biotic settings, providing the di-rect empirical basis; (2) ethnographic evidence from historical foraging socie-ties about techno-ecological adjustments making survival in boreal and subarctic areas feasible, which remains the most appropriate, straightforward and produc-tive source of controlled comparisons for interpreting Palaeolithic adaptations in North Eurasia.

MAJOR MIDDLE PALAEOLITHIC OCCURRENCES IN EURASIA:AN OUTLINE OF DIAGNOSTIC CONTENTS

APPENDIX

Bracketed site numbers (Ochtmissen excepted) are to be found also on Fig. 1. Some sites information remains rudimentary, but with essential aspects (habi-tat, time-climatic phase and age, latitude, continental setting, fl ora and fauna). Latitude coordinates may be approximately accurate or precise, depending on information. Key references are given for each site. Symbol “*” indicates caves or rock shelters.

ACHENHEIM III “SOL 74” [9] (Heim et al. 1982; Sainty and Thévenin 1978). This major Pleistocene location, west of Strasbourg, 48.3° N contains a series of Mid- and Late Pleistocene cycles of sand, loess, loessic loam depos-its and mammal fauna spanning fi ve climatic cycles over 350 000 years. The in situ “Sol 74” Middle Palaeolithic archaeological fl oor belongs to the Achenheim horizon IVb, “Upper Older Loess” series, middle terrace IV. Thought to be the Early Weichsel (OIS 4), it actually dates to the Late Saalian (OIS 6) periglacial, following revisions (Heim et al. 1982), correlated perhaps with Ariendorf and Rheindahlen B3 in the Rhineland (Bosinski 1986: 27). It comprises concentration areas of bones and artefacts. The centre depression holds the remains of processed carcasses of rhino, horse and bison associated with only few implements (chop-ping tools). In the south rectangular area, fl ake tools (racloirs, chopping tools, fl akes) are more numerous, associated with fragmented bones of the same species, mammoths and Megaceros. The occurrence is interpreted as an animal butchering and processing site, rather than a killing or home base.

16 Nicolas Rolland

ARIENDORF [13], SCHWEINSKOPF [12], TÖNCHESBERG [11], WAN-NEN [10] (Bosinski 1983; 1986; Bosinski et al. 1986; Turner 1990). The Neuwied Basin, Central Rhineland, is formed by the river’s fl ow through slates of the Rhenish Shield, at ca. 51° N (Turner 1986, Fig. 2). The eastern Eifel, west bank area, contains a concentration of extinct volcanoes. During the Pleistocene, the re-gion experienced sharp temperate and periglacial alternations, evidenced by loess, ice wedges, cryoturbation, solifl uxion, soil formations, and repeated volcanic eruptions leaving basalt and ash deposits as markers. These events left a rich time-climatic and palaeoenvironmental record, with organic materials preservation and a geochronological framework, including tephra horizons, radiometric dating by argon, K/Ar, TL and 14C. In addition, the region contains discrete, brief Lower and Middle Palaeolithic occupation episodes with mammal remains (Bosinski et al. 1986, Fig. 4; Turner 1990, Fig. 3). These occurrences comprise only small artefact collections, making detailed techno-typological sequences problematic, but signifi cant for hominid ecology by showing biotopes exploitation under con-trasting circumstances, including periglacials, as well as palethnological docu-ments from in situ occupation fl oor patterns (Bosinski 1983, Figs 9, 17, 22; Bosinski et al. 1986, Figs 11, 16). The occurrences below are Saalian loess stadi-als (OIS 6, OIS 8).

Ariendorf, located further north on the Rhine, contains three Middle Palaeo-lithic and fossil mammal units: Ariendorf Channel, Ariendorf 1 and 2. The fi rst two belong to early Saalian cold stage (OIS 8), and Ariendorf 2 to the late Saalian (OIS 6). Trogontherii mammoth, horse, woolly rhino, giant elk, reindeer, red deer and a large bovine are found in the early Saalian units. A transitional trogontherii-primigenius mammoth, horse, red deer and bison are associated with Ariendorf 2. The following occurrences come from volcanic crater deposits. Tönchesberg 1 dates to late Saalian loess, with horse, mammoth, red deer (mostly shed antlers), reindeer and large bovine. Schweinskopf 1, 2, 3 belong to late Saalian loess cold stage (OIS 6), with an uranium date of 165 ka for unit 2, with mammoth, rhino, horse, reindeer, giant elk and bovine. Wannen 1, 2, 3 belong to the late Saalian, with rhino, horse, red deer and some carnivores. Most mammal bones (carni-vores excluded) are broken and anthropogenic. The industries, in quartz, quartzite or fl int, contain small quantities of fl akes (including some Levallois), racloirs (Bosinski et al. 1986, Figs 19–20, 25–27). The sites represent special activity occurrences. The Neuwied Basin provided attractive habitats (perhaps due to a primary production enhanced by volcanic soil trace elements) for the ungulate species exploited by humans.

ARYSHEVSKOE 1 [40] (Zenin 2002; Zenin et al. 2000; Vasil’ev et al. 2002). This factory site, 56.8° N, near the Chulym River, Ob’-Yenisei interfl uve, is known from brief reports. The artefacts show various core reduction meth-ods (radial, convergent, parallel, orthogonal). Tools include racloirs, denticulates, notches. The occurrence, dated to >40 ka, may be actually older.


BEAUVAIS-LA-JUSTICE [5] (Locht et al. 1995). This occurrence over-looks the Thérain Valley, Beauvais Commune, Paris Basin, ca. 49.5° N. The sequence comprises six layers. Two Middle Palaeolithic archaeological layers, 6a and 6b, come from yellow-brown sandy matrices. Dating the site and age of hu-man occupation to the Late Saalian (OIS 6) remains likely: (a) by attributing to the Eemian/Earliest Weichsel the layers 3 and 4 pedocomplex developed on underly-ing sediments that show eolisation and frost traces; (b) whereas Early Weichsel loess deposits are thin, scarce or absent in the region, the Eemian palaeosols often represent the surface; (c) U-Th dates of reindeer samples indicate 160–210 ka. ESR dating is also planned. The abundant, well-preserved mammal suite illus-trates a typical Mammoth-Steppe Biome association, dominated by reindeer, fol-lowed by horse, rhino, mammoth and bison. This, and continental steppe rodents, point to a cold periglacial open, arid steppe landscape. The two abundant assem-blages contain 11 700 fl int artefacts (lower layer 6b) and ca. 2000 pieces (upper layer 6b). Lithic reduction includes prepared-core fl aking sensu lato dominated by disc-cores. Pseudo-Levallois points, retouched fl akes, many racloirs, notches, denticulates, backed knives constitute the typological composition. Beauvais-La-Justice site represents a human occupation during severe periglacial Late Saalian conditions, near 50° N.

BETOVO [28] (Tarasov 1977; Velichko 1988). This site, upper Desna, ca. 53° N, has a Middle Palaeolithic horizon in the lower levels of a deposits se-ries. That horizon was re-deposited by solifl uxion down a valley slope, during the Smolensk cryophase of the Early Valdai glacial, correlated with OIS 4, ca. 70 ka (Velichko 1988, Fig. 6). The fl ora and fauna, comprising woolly mammoth and rhino, reindeer, red deer, bison, saiga, marmot, lemming (Tarasov 1977, Table 1) indicate an open tundra-steppe habitat with scarce trees and shrubs and cold sta-dial conditions in the eastern Russian Plain paraperiglacial zone. The fl int industry is a non-Levallois facies with prepared core (disc core, single surface cores) and implements dominated by denticulates, notches (Tarasov 1977: 27, Figs 3, 4).

BOGDANOVKA [38] (Shirokov 1992). The site, located near the village of the same name, Cheliabinsk region, left bank of the river Ural, ca. 150 miles south of Magnitogorsk, 53° N, comes from a salvage operation (Shirokov 1992). The information is preliminary. The fi nds consist in stone artefacts and mam-mal bones in loessic alluvium at the base of a seven layers sequence (1992, Fig. 1A). The Pleistocene fauna is the Mammoth-Steppe Biome with mammoth, rhino, horse, bison, red deer, reindeer, saiga, cave bear, in a highly fragmentary state. Dating is outstanding. The rich Middle Palaeolithic assemblage (789 pieces) is made of various raw materials (radiolarite, indurated shale and red jasper).

*COTTE ST. BRELADE B, 3, 6 [2] (Callow and Cornford 1986; Scott 1980). The site, in a granite inselberg or “head”, in southwest Jersey Island, English

18 Nicolas Rolland

Channel, >49° N, was described in detail. The Middle and Late Pleistocene de-posit sequence of 40 m and 23 units, made of beach and grus materials, alternating aeolian sand and loess and reworked loess series, has a unique, complex geomor-phology and geochemical formation history, due to its changing geography, evi-denced by lithology, palynology, faunal studies and special analyses. During most of the sequence, it remained a peninsula attached to the Cotentin in Normandy, though distance between the site and the beach varied according to sea level changes. It became an island only during the Eemian interglacial. Pollen analysis shows alternating phases of temperate woodland, cool mixed woodland and grass-lands, and cold dry steppe tundra open landscapes with arctic plants and scarce trees (birch, conifers), when winter maximum could drop to –40°C. The Saalian Complex sequence shows alternating periglacial, boreal and temperate phases. During Stage II (layers H to C), temperate and boreal phases predominated (Cal-low and Cornford 1986, Fig. 7.2). Mosaic vegetation landscapes comprised vari-able frequencies of birch, elm, oak, pine, juniper, though herbaceous pollens tend to predominate. During Stage III (layers B to 6.1), periglacial conditions (includ-ing three severe oscillations and winter maximum dropping) dominated, with loess and reworked loess sediments. Pollens are scarce, but indicate a prevalence of steppe-tundra landscapes with arctic plants. The mammalian fauna comprised typically: woolly mammoth and rhinos, reindeer, red deer, horse, bison, bear, wolf and arctic fox. The Weichsel Stages IV and V show alternating steppe and boreal phases with beach, aeolian sands and loess sediments.

The Saalian and Weichselian sequences contain abundant stone artefacts (over 100 000 pieces), charcoal and ashes, bone fragments. Regular human oc-cupation begins with layer H. A TL dating gives 238 ka for layer C/D during Stage II. Flint remained by far the dominant lithic material, procured from beach pebbles, exploited with profl igacy (Stage II) or parsimony (Stage III), depending on the access distance to beach pebbles related to sea level fl uctuations. During Stage II, assemblages contain mostly notches, serrated tools and raw fl akes, and during Stage III, various racloirs and retouched points become frequent. La Cotte St. Brelade remains a remarkable site due to the fact that: (a) alternating cycles of temperate, boreal and periglacial phases and techno-typological variations in lithic assemblages indicate that hominids occupied the region by different cycles of subsistence and land use strategies, exploiting by broad-spectrum foraging the available resources of trophic pyramid; (b) ecological polymorphism combined with cultural means enabled surviving during severe Saalian Complex stadials. Layers 3 and 6 represent brief occupation events involving the stampeding off the granite inselberg, and processing of adult woolly mammoth and rhinos (the skulls, shoulder blade and vertebrae of nine mammoths and two rhinos in layer 3; eleven mammoths and three rhinos in layer 6).

*DVUGLAZKA 5, 6 [52] (Abramova 1981; 1985; Derevianko 1998; Goebel 1993; Vasil’ev et al. 2002). This cave occurrence, 45 km north of Abakan, Khakas


Autonomous Region, 54.1° N, is situated on the Tolcheiia affl uent of the Yenisei (Minusinsk Basin), north of the Sayan range and west of the Kuznetsk-Alatau range. The palaeoenvironment indicated by mammal association during the Mid-dle Palaeolithic occupation points to an interstadial warm dry steppe environment (Abramova 1981: 76). The Middle Palaeolithic horizons date to the later Karginsk interstadial, with 14C dates of 27 ka (layer 7) and 26.6 ka (layer 4). The seven archaeological strata contain Middle Palaeolithic “Component III” (layers 4, 5, 6, 7), and Upper Palaeolithic series. The Middle Palaeolithic shows characteristic Levallois facies traits, Levallois and disc cores, Levallois points, fl akes (Abramo-va 1981, Fig. 1), racloirs, denticulates and fl akes.

DZIERZYSŁAW I [20] (Foltyn et al. 2000). The site, known by a brief report, is located ca. 50° N in Upper Silesia, NW of the Moravian Gate, near the Psina River, an affl uent of the Odra (Oder). The small artefact collection comes from Pleistocene deposits on the Czarna Gora plateau, found in layer 6 at the bot-tom of the sequence (2000, Fig. 2) in fi ne laminated sandy loess matrix, TL dated to 180 ka. The loess is partly truncated by erosion and topped by a sedimentary hiatus, and identifi ed as the “Upper Older Loess” Warthe stadial horizon (OIS 6) of the Saalian Complex. The Dzierzysław I is signifi cant for its artefact contents, and early human occupation during stadial conditions. The implements represent the earliest known asymmetrical bifaces, a Blattschaber and plano-convex artefact fragments with a diagnostic Prądnikian lateral tranchet (2000, Fig. 3).

EL’NIKI II, GARCHI I, *BOL’SHOI GLUKHOI [32,33,35] (Guslitzer and Pavlov 1987; 1993; Pavlov et al. 2004). El’niki II, 58° N at the junction of the Sylva and Kama rivers near Perm, Northwest Urals, lies at the bottom of thick loess series, waterlogged most of the year. Anthropic material consists of an in situ chopping tool associated with M. trogontheri bones, and an adjacent fl ake, pointing to a late Mid-Pleistocene possible datum for hominid presence; Garchi I, 59° N, known for an Early Upper Palaeolithic industry, has a Middle Palaeo-lithic horizon of stratifi ed but undiagnostic fl akes, and derived characteristic Mid-dle Palaeolithic implements nearby; Bol’shoi Glukhoi, a rockshelter ca. 58° N, in the foothills of the Chusovaya river, has abundant mammal bones (reindeer, giant elk, brown bear, cave hyena, wolverine, cave lion, wolf, arctic fox and small mammals) diagnostic of steppe, forest and tundra mosaics. Many split long bones suggest human action. The site contains quartzite choppers and fl akes. Dating is inconclusive: some fauna point to the late Mid-Pleistocene, though the deposits may span into the earlier Late Pleistocene. Human occupation consisted probably of brief visits.

KHOTYK [53] (Lbova 2000; Lbova et al. 2003; Vasil’ev et al. 2002). This new site, the Ona region of Trans-Baikalia, NE of Uland-Ude, 52.3° N, Buryat Autonomous Republic, Siberia, has a Middle (layers 4–6) and Upper Palaeo lithic (layers 3–1) sequence. Trans-Baikalia is marked by topographic, altitude and mi-

20 Nicolas Rolland

croenvironment contrasts, an extreme continental climate and sharp seasonal vari-ations, on the border between East Siberian mountain taiga and Central Asian steppe ecosystems. The palaeoenvironment reconstructed from pollens, spores and palaeopedology for Khotyk during early Zyriansk stadial (OIS 4) indicates that the region, though periglacial, was dominated by open arid steppe habitats (Grami-nae, Ericacae, Artemisia, scarce trees, e.g. pine) and severe climate with perma-frost. Mammals include woolly rhino, Siberian gazelle, horse, bovine, marmot and rodents. The in situ Middle Palaeolithic horizons span the Kazantsevo interglacial (OIS 5e) and early Zyriansk, with RTL dates (Lbova 2002, Table 1). The industry shows Levallois fl ake-blades, racloirs, “citrus” pebble reduction, single surface cores, and many pebble tools (2003, Figs 39, 40, 42). Layer 5 is an occupation surface with scattered bones, cores, choppers, racloirs (Lbova et al. 2003, Fig. 41).

KHOTYLEVO I [27] (Velichko 1988; Velichko et al. 1981). This Middle Palaeolithic site is located 18 km NW of Briansk, on the fi rst Desna terrace, upper Dnieper Basin, in the east Russian Plain, 53.5° N. The archaeological oc-currence comes from re-deposited alluvium covered by loess. The pollens asso-ciated with the alluvium indicate a cool tundra-forest habitat. Mammals include mammoth, woolly rhino, bison, a large horse, reindeer, red deer, brown bear and wolf. The climate-stratigraphic setting corresponds with onset of the Smolensk cryogenic horizon A cold oscillation, correlated with OIS 5b (1988, Fig. 6), ca. 90 ka. The industry is abundant (18 000 artefacts, including 1600 cores), made of dark-greenish fl int. The assemblage is varied, with bifacial implements, including a leafpoint-like pieces, points and racloirs (1981, Fig. 16). The site illustrates, along others like Betovo, Chulatovo, Rikhta, Dubovka, a hominid occupation of higher latitude and continental habitats, namely the “east European paraperigla-cial, temperate-polar zone”, during cold oscillations or stadials.

LICHTENBERG [17] (Veil et al. 1995). This site, Lüchow-Dannenberg dis-trict, Lower Saxony, is near a fossil glacial lakeshore, south of the Elbe, >53° N. It illustrates conclusively human occupation in a biotically rich periglacial setting. The southernmost advance of Weichsel ice sheets, lying 75 km north, never reached the Lichtenberg valley. The stratifi cation gives a clear picture (1995, Fig. 4) of the chrono-climatic position of the site above a series of early Weichsel fl uctuations (Brørup, Odderade) and Saalian glacial deposits. The lithology (sandy and muddy sediments, ice wedges, solifl uction traces), pollen (non-arboreal), mammals (mammoth, horse, reindeer) evidence and average TL dates of 57 ka, indicate that occupation took place during an early Weichsel stadial, or lower pleniglacial cor-related with OIS 4. The Middle Palaeolithic fl int industry comprises 76 artefacts consisting of tools or implements brought into the site (only one core). Bifacial implements dominate the assemblage (Keilmesser, bifacial racloirs, fl at racloirs, fl at and cordiform or triangular handaxes – Figs 19–26). Unifacial implements include racloirs, retouched or utilized fl akes and one denticulate (1995, Table 4).

The industry belongs clearly to the “Keilmessergruppen” of Central Europe.


LYNFORD [4] (Boismier et al. 2003). The site, NE of Mumford village, Norfolk, 52.5° N, found in a quarry and saved by salvage excavation, contains rich palaeobiological evidence (plants, pollens, insects, molluscs, mammals). The archaeological material comes from one of lower deposits horizons in a brown/dark brown matrix with silt and fi ne sand fi lling a palaeochannel, up to 0.70 m thick. Deposition took place under still water or low-energy moving water. The palaeovegetation indicates a biotically rich open grassland landscape with patches of birch, scrub, heath, bog and some pine and spruce further away. The mammals comprise 2079 remains, including fragments of nine woolly mammoth individu-als, woolly rhinos, reindeer, horse, bison, wolf, arctic fox, brown bear, a Pine Hole Zone faunal suite. The pollens, mammals and beetles indicate a cold stadial set-ting, with July mean temperature of 13°C or less, and winter below –10°C. This, and OSL dates of 64 000 and 67 BP, fi t with the early Devensian glacial, corre-lated with OIS 4. The Middle Palaeolithic industry (487 pieces) is Mousterian of Acheulean tradition with 66 pointed, cordiform, bout coupé, ovate and unifacial handaxes, some racloirs, notches, denticulates and a few cores. Lynford represents a little disturbed butchering occurrence, shown by broken and tools carried into the site, a palimpsest of recurrent occupations with tools carried into the site.

MARKKLEEBERG [19] (Baumann and Mania 1983). This locality, ca. 51.5° N, studied for over a century, represents one of the richest Palaeolithic sites in Cen-tral Europe. It is situated 8 km south of Leipzig, Saxony, in laminated grav-els of the Pleisse river “Hauptterrasse”, formed by proglacial lakes during the Mid-Pleistocene ice ages. Its probably biotically rich periglacial habitat with steppe-tundra vegetation attracted ungulates (trogontherii and primigenius woolly mammoth and rhinos, horse) and hominids, shown by numerous Palaeolithic sites in the region. Lithostratigraphy and other evidence established conclusively an early Saalian Complex stadial age (OIS 8). The site, extremely rich in fl int arte-facts (several thousand pieces), illustrates an early Middle Palaeolithic occurrenc-es, with Levallois fl aking and handaxes. It functioned as a raw material quarry, but it cannot be concluded whether the associated fauna represents evidence of hominid exploitation or remains of animals living in the region at that time. The main interest is that it documents an early (OIS 8 or ca. 300 ka) human presence in a periglacial context.

MESVIN IV [7] 56° N (Cahen and Michel 1986; Van Neer 1986). Situated in the Mons area, Wampe valley, 56° N, Belgium, the site is in compacted cailloutis sediments comprising fl int nodules, sand lenses from two broad level channels incising Palaeocene sands (Cahen and Michel 1986, Fig. 2). The mint state of artefact, while associated Mid-Pleistocene mammal bones show limited distur-bance and transport – many refi tted pieces (Fig. 3) – suggests an occurrence on the channel shore, or inside its dried bed. The mammals indicate a dry, cold open steppe landscape with tree patches. Uranium dating of mammoth bones gave an average 263.5 ka, or a 250–300 ka span. Comparison of different mammal spe-

22 Nicolas Rolland

cies, dominated by woolly mammoth, rhino and the large Equus remagensis, some reindeer and giant elk, bison, cave lion (Van Neer 1986, Table 1) with other sites (Achenheim, Tourville) and radiometric readings indicate a periglacial environ-ment dateable to the early Saalian stadial, correlated with OIS 8. The industry comprises nearly 8000 artefacts, including 274 tools. Levallois fl aking is repre-sented by refi tted cores, points, fl akes and a suite of racloirs, Mousterian points, natural backed knives, notches and denticulates (Cahen and Michel 1986: Table 1, Figs 4, 5), bifacial implements, and Prądnik-like pieces. A key signifi cance of Mesvin IV is that it is an early Middle Palaeolithic hominid occupation in a high latitude periglacial steppe habitat.

MUNGHARYMA [55] (Mochanov and Fedoseeva 2001; 2002). This new site near the Viliuy and Lena rivers confl uence, in Sakha (Yakutia), 64° N is known only by limited information. The deposits (2001, Fig. 4) contain a typical Mammoth-Steppe fauna of mammoth, woolly rhino and other elements. Dating by OSL ranged 150–38 ka above the deposits, though the Late Pleistocene (OIS 4 or early OIS 3) seems plausible. The diagnostic Middle Palaeolithic kyzylsyrskoi industry is dominated by bifacial fl ake implements: points, convex racloirs, plano-convex implements, bifaces, Prądnik knives (2002, Figs 15–19), reminiscent of the Sukhaya Mechetka Valley, Volga region, European Russia.

OCHTMISSEN (Thieme 2003). This new occurrence, Lüneburg Borough, Lower Saxony, >53.5° N is situated near the Ilmenau River, an affl uent of the Elbe 6 km away, and 70 km northwest of the Lichtenberg site. Its stratigraphic position (2003, Fig. 3 profi le), chrono-climatic lithological features, and Middle Palaeo-lithic assemblage contents concur in giving the site a relative age corresponding with the Warthe stadial (OIS 6) of Saalian Complex. The site contains no pre-served fauna. The artefacts come from fl uvial, gravely, sandy detritus matrix, in-serted within a periglacial permafrost formations with ice wedges and underlying polygon soil. Weichsel time-climatic indicators lie well above the archaeological horizon (2003: 598–599). The good quality Baltic fl int industry with some 60 Late Acheulean handaxes (40% of the fi nds), Levallois fl akes, blades, racloirs (2003, Figs 4, 5), suggests a specialized occupation, chronologically and typologically distinct from the Lichtenberg Keilmesser occurrence in the region. Ochtmissen represents an earlier hominid occupation in a periglacial habitat.

*OKLADNIKOV [41] (Derevianko 1998; Derevianko and Markin 1992; Goebel 1993; Vasil’ev et al. 2002). This south-facing cave in the Siberian Altai, in Sibiriiachikhai village, overlooking the river of the same name, in Soloneshensk District (Derevianko and Markin 1992, Figs 1, 2), 51.7° N, lies in a complex karstic limestone formation comprising a rockshelter, a cave and fi ve galleries at different levels, some unexcavated (1992, Fig. 3; 1998, Fig. 59). The report describes the excavation and recording methods (1992, Chapter III) and contents. The deposits


comprise up to ten strata, depending on excavated areas, whose thickness varies, becoming thinner inside. The fl ora (1992: 79–81) indicates a steppe-woodland mosaic, with birch, pine species, fi r, oak, willow, alder and various non-arboreal species (chenopods, sagebrush), analogous with the present-day habitat. Mam-mals also show an ecotone situation of steppe-tundra (woolly mammoth and rhino, reindeer, horse, bison) and mountain (Siberian mountain goat) species, argali, red deer, carnivores (cave hyena, wolf, wolverine, panther, lynx, fox, black bear, small mammals and birds) (1992: 82–89). Freshwater fi sh remains, probably anthropogenic, were present. The remarkable industry from seven archaeological layers and 3819 artefacts shows fl uctuating frequencies of Levallois fl akes and racloirs (straight, convergent, bilateral, dejetés) of variable sizes. Archaic modern humans remains include large teeth and three long bones. The site is dated by 14C, AMS and uranium, ranges from 32.4 to 44.8 ka (1992: 90), hence the Karginsk (OIS 3) interstadial.

*SCLADINA 5 [8] (Otte et al. 1998). The Scladina cave is one of the Sclayn karstic cavity complexes on the right bank of the Maas River, near Andenne, Namur Province, 56.3° N. It overlooks the small Ri de Pontainne river. The Scladina cave is a gallery ramifi cation network, more or less fi lled with sediments constituting 7 strata. Human evidence comes from: layer 1A and part of the un-derlying level 40, a later Middle Palaeolithic dated by 14C to 38 560 BP during the OIS 3 Interpleniglacial; layer 4A containing a Neanderthal child remains, but no artefacts; layer 5 representing the main occupation episode, with an early Weichsel Middle Palaeolithic occurrence TL dated to 130 ka from burnt fl ints. The palaeoclimatic succession, worked out in detail with revisions, shows alternating temperate, boreal and cold episodes (1998, Fig. 2). Layer 5 was occupied during the Saint-Germain 1B cold oscillation (1998, Table 5) correlated with OIS 5c/b, with cryoclastic deposits. Mammals form an ecotone mosaic of alpine, steppe-tundra and forest elements, dominated by chamois, some ibex, woolly rhino and mammoth, reindeer, horse, red deer, giant elk, red deer, roe deer, fallow deer, wolf, cave lion, wild dog, fox, panther, cave hyena and wolverine (Patou-Mathis 1998, Tables 1, 3, 5). Scladina functioned as a carnivore lair, with episodic hominid occupations. The lithic industry (almost 9000 artefacts) includes raw materials of local, nearby and distant sources, dominated by white quartz and followed by chert, maastricht fl int, brown quartzite, a few exotic fl ints, sandstone and phtanite. Reduction techniques combined (depending on raw materials shape, size and tex-ture) Levallois, discoid, single and bifacial cores (Moncel 1998: 181–247), as well as specialized “methods” (Bourguignon 1998: 249–276) – also used at Susiluola, Finland – that fi ts with the Quina variant technology.

SIBERIAN ALTAI MIDDLE PALAEOLITHIC [42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47] (Der-evianko 1998; Derevianko et al. 2003; Goebel 1993; Vasil’ev et al. 2002). Large-scale investigations yielded Late Pleistocene environmental fl uctuations and Mid-

24 Nicolas Rolland

dle and Upper Palaeolithic sequences. The Altai combines Central Asian and South Siberian characteristics, with vegetation mosaics of Central Asian, Siberian and Mandchurian biomes. The Pleistocene habitats remained very continental during temperate and stadial phases with marked seasonal contrasts, despite lack of permafrost. The known sites covered briefl y below illustrate situations with mi-cro-environmental differences. The Middle Palaeolithic contains typical techno-typological features, as well as original ones like the recurrence of true bifacial leafpoints. Several sites evidence Middle to Upper Palaeolithic transitional hori-zons. This indicates clearly that the transition remained an entirely self-contained linear development.

Denisova Cave, 51.4° N, adjacent to the Anui River, contains a lengthy Palaeo-lithic sequence during changing bio-climatic condition, in the context of an en-closed valley through which ungulate herds migrated. Ust’ Karakol is an open-air site, 51.4° N, in an open setting at the contact of several valleys, containing Mid-dle Palaeolithic series; Ust’Kanskaiia Cave, 50.1° N, overlooks the Charysh river, an affl uent of the Ob river, and dominates a wide vista of converging valleys. It was sheltered most of the year against wind or cold. It has a long, complex Middle and Upper Palaeolithic series and fauna; Kara-Bom, a large open-air occurrence with wide vista, 50.7° N, contains another long Middle and Upper Palaeolithic series, including early Middle to Upper Palaeolithic transition; Kaminnaiia Cave, at 51.3° N lies near the end of a moist and narrower valley, with Middle and Early Upper Palaeolithic horizons.

*SUSILUOLA [37] (“WOLF CAVE”) (Mahaney et al. 2001; Rolland n.d., Schultz et al. 2002). The site, 62.2° N and 116.5 ASL, is located 2 km from Karijoki town, South Ostrobothnia, Western Finland. It consists of a wide hori-zontal cave fi ssure fi lled by Quaternary deposits at the top of Susivuori (“Wolf Hill”), developed from Precambrian granite and gneiss covered by Quaternary deposits. Palaeolithic artefacts, discovered when enlarging the space inside the cave, prompted research by a multi-disciplinary team. Ostrobothnia benefi ts from a well-studied record of Pleistocene littoral deposits from marine transgression, tills and eskers left by the Saalian and Weichsel glacials. Seven geological strata were identifi ed: layers I and II are the early Neothermal with rocks, boulders and sediments washed in by marine wave action and packed ice; layer III’s geological origin is unknown; layers IV 1 and IV 2 form a weathering horizon and Eemian interglacial fl oor, developed from layer V’s sand and gravel; layer VI is a littoral deposit; layer VII consists of dark gravel of unknown morphogenesis. Several criteria support an Eemian (OIS 5e) age: pollen samples (Schultz et al. 2002, Figs 16, 17) embedded in the washed-in sediments showing a tree-dominated (birch, pine, spruce, Alnus) landscape for layer IV; littoral deposits inside the cave with clay minerals and Fe-Ai elements indicating a warmer and wetter palaeo-climate than presently; TL, OSL and IRSL radiometric dates show >100 ka that


correlates with similar local and regional evidence (Hütt et al. 1993; Mahaney et al. 2001; Nenonen et al. 1991). Pleistocene faunal remains were not preserved in Susiluola, though interglacial and interstadial evidence of mammoth and reindeer were found in the region (Kurtén 1988; Ukkonen et al. 1999).

This unexpected discovery and geographically eccentric location of “Wolf Cave” was received sceptically initially, despite its Pleistocene deposits. Dis-criminating Palaeolithic artefacts from “geofactual noise” in materials modifi ed by geological compression and water abrasion can be problematic. Several crite-ria, nevertheless, support the Palaeolithic identity: (1) lithic raw materials. Seven different kinds of materials are present and their fl aking properties were exam-ined: four or fi ve are local (red, grey quartzite, quartz, red sandstone, volcanic?), two are exotic, hence introduced by human action, namely yellow-brown or reddish-brown small siltstone pebbles, and fi ne-grained quartzite (Schultz et al. 2002: 18–21, Fig. 8); (2) large number of pieces with diagnostic fl ake release attributes (Schultz et al. 2002, Plate I); (3) artefacts clearly concentrated in four layers grouped as archaeological units, instead of scattered randomly throughout the sequence, had they been pseudo-artefacts. Unit I, Early Holocene, contains 18 pieces, whereas 748 pieces cluster in Unit II or layers IV–V. Some 112 are from the lower Unit III (layers VI–VII); (4) an in situ pavement and artefacts in the layer IV interglacial fl oor (Schultz et al. 2002, Fig. 7); (5) fi re traces shown by burnt stones at the edge of the pavement and strong susceptibility measure-ment anomalies in fi ne sediments near the stones, splinters and rock fragments from the cave vault and charcoal particles, a charcoal lens among big boulders near the entrance (removed during the cave enlargement). Most layers show dis-turbance and re-deposition.

Despite the artefacts’ weathered, abraded state, two reduction techniques are identifi ed (Schultz et al. 2002, Figs 13, 14) – see also Scladina Cave, Belgium – conditioned by raw material shape, size, texture and fl aking properties: “parallel fl aking on two crossing axes and core rotation” for red siltstone and fi ne quartzite; “alternate fl aking on two crossing axes” for other quartzites and sandstone, and bipolar reduction for vein quartz (one fl ake-blade piece). Typological identifi ca-tion, despite water abrasion, shows denticulates, notches, side scrapers and chop-pers. The Eemian age and assemblage contents indicate a Middle Palaeolithic occurrence. Fieldwork, interrupted to allow consolidation work of the cave roof to prevent collapse, was resumed with limited probing. Unexcavated layers and much archaeological material lie at the back of the cave (Schultz, personal com-munication 2001).

The apparently isolated situation of Susiluola, at 62.2° N in Scandinavia, is more apparent than real. It compares with the Pontnewydd Cave, North Wales,

26 Nicolas Rolland

Cotte St. Brelade, and Roche Gélétan, Normandy. During the peak Eemian warm episode and highest sea transgression, Susivuori became a small island in the Gulf of Bothnia. Other high latitude Middle Palaeolithic occurrences exist in the Western Urals and Yakutia. Middle Palaeolithic occupation during interglacials or interstadials probably took place in Karelia and Eastern Baltic, but a virtual absence of caves (Susiluola that acted as unique sediment trap) made probable obliteration by Last Fennoscandian ice sheet advances. The Middle Palaeolithic human occupation of Susiluola was an occupation palimpsest during a brief Last Interglacial span. Humans colonizing boreal forest habitats burned deliberately bush and woodlands, the spread of hazelnuts being an anthropogenic marker (Clark 1975: 53).

UST’ IZHUL’ [48] (Chlachula et al. 2003; Drozdov et al. 1999). The site, at 55.1° N south of Kranoyarsk, Kurtak archaeological region in the Minusinsk Basin, a part of the Yenisei drainage system, bound west by the Kuznetsky-Ala-tau range, the Sayans to the south and east, lies on the west side of Kranoyarsk Lake formed by the Yenisei hydraulic dam. Fluctuation water levels eroded loessic deposits, exposing an intact land surface containing archaeological ma-terials (mammoth remains, artefacts, hearths). Quaternary investigations (Dro-zdov et al. 1999) uncovered a lengthy Mid- and Late Pleistocene time-climatic sequence showing alternating loess, ice wedges, colluviated loess, palaeosols, and chernozem horizons. The Last, or Kazantsevo interglacial (OIS 5e) age of Ust’ Izhul’ is established by: detailed local stratigraphic series, including a steppe chernozem horizon, widespread throughout the southern Siberian loess region; the Blake geomagnetic event above the chernozem horizon; pollen analysis; mi-crotine fauna; land molluscs; the thick mammoth molar enamel indicating an ar-chaic, residual Mid-Pleistocene trait; 14C dates > 45 ka, IRSL dates of ca. 125 ka. This evidence indicates a steppe-parkland landscape, milder and moister than the present-day severe hyper-continental cold climate. Archaeological evidence revolves around a butchering surface with remains of at least 12 mammoths (mostly adults), rhino and bison, bearing traces of dismemberment, cutmarks and parallel striations. Three hearths are found in the site. The industry includes 220 mint artefacts, mostly in situ, consisting largely (204 pieces) in utilized fl akes (some conjoinable) bearing use-wear traces, a few retouched pieces, cores and choppers. There are fl aked mammoth bones and teeth ivory, fl aked rhino and bison bones. Ust’ Izhul’ provides evidence for reconstructing Middle Palaeolithic habitats and life styles in the Kurtak region. The vegetation combined southern taiga spruce, pine, Siberian pine, birch, and steppe grassland. Mammals (mam-moth, rhino, reindeer, giant elk, bison, saiga, bear and small mammals) show a rich biodiversity in an ecotone situation of steppe and parkland. Mammoths were probably driven off a terrace and steep slope towards the riverside into marshy soft grounds, suggested by the site’s position above the confl uence of the Ust’ Izhul’ and Yenisei palaeorivers.


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