Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-2brh9 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-22T21:26:43.474Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Neolithization of Siberia and the Russian Far East: radiocarbon evidence

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 January 2015

Yaroslav V. Kuzmin  and
Lyubov A. Orlova
Yaroslav V. Kuzmin
Affiliation:
Pacific Institute of Geography, Far Eastern Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences. Radio St. 7, Vladivostok 690041, Russia [email protected]
Lyubov A. Orlova
Affiliation:
United Institute of Geology, Geophysics & Mineralogy, Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Koptuyg Ave. 3, Novosibirsk 630090, Russia
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Results of recent excavations and radiocarbon dating show that several places in Siberia and the Russian Far East, such as the Lower Amur River basin and the Transbaikal, represent independent centres of pottery invention, and all pre-date 10,000 BP. These two areas should be considered among the earliest centres of pottery origins in East Asia and the Old World. The rest of Siberia is characterized by significantly later appearance of Neolithic cultures, between c. 8000 BP and c. 4600–2600 BP.

Keywords

NeolithicpotteryradiocarbonSiberiaRussian Far East
Type
Papers
Information
Antiquity , Volume 74 , Issue 284 , June 2000 , pp. 356 - 364
Copyright
Copyright © Antiquity Publications Ltd. 2000

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Ackerman, R.E. 1982. The Neolithic-Bronze Age cultures of Asia and the Norton phase of Alaskan prehistory, Arctic Anthropology 19(2): 11–38.Google Scholar
Aikens, C.M. 1995. First in the world: The Jomon pottery of early Japan, in Barnett, W.K. & Hoopes, J.W. (ed.), The emergence of pottery: technology and innovations in ancient societies: 11–21. Washington (DC) & London: Smithsonian Institution Press.Google Scholar
Chard, C.E. 1974. Northeast Asia in prehistory. Madison (WI): University of Wisconsin Press.Google Scholar
Derevianko, A.P. & Medvedev, V.E.. 1995. The Amur River basin as one of the earliest centers of ceramics in the Far East, in Kajiwara (ed.): 13–25.Google Scholar
Dikov, N.N. 1977. Archaeological sites in Kamchatka, Chukotka, and the Kolyma River headwaters. Moscow: Nauka [in Russian].Google Scholar
Dikov, N.N. 1979. Ancient cultures of the Northeastern Asia. Moscow: Nauka [in Russian).Google Scholar
Dikov, N.N. 1993. Asia at the joint with America in prehistory (Stone Age of the Chikchi Peninsula). St Petersburg: Nauka [in Russian).Google Scholar
Dikova, T.M. 1983. South Kamchatka archaeology in the context of the Ainu occupation problem. Moscow: Nauka [in Russian].Google Scholar
Dumond, D.E. & Bland, R.L.. 1995. Holocene prehistory of the northernmost North Pacific, Journal of World Prehistory 9(4): 401–51.Google Scholar
Kajiwara, H. (ed.). 1995. The origin of ceramics in East Asia and the Far East. Abstracts of International Symposium, Sendai, Japan, 29 Septembers October 1995. Sendai: Tohoku Fukushi University Press.Google Scholar
Kiryak, M.A. 1993. Archaeology of Western Chukotka in the context of the Yukagir problem. Moscow: Nauka [in Russian].Google Scholar
Khiobystin, L.P 1996. Eastern Siberia and the Far East, in Oshibkina (ed.): 270–329.Google Scholar
Konstantinov, M.V. 1994. The Stone Age archaeological sites of Baikalian Asia. Chita: Chita State Teacher Training College Press [in Russian].Google Scholar
Korobkova, G.F. 1996. Middle Asia and Kazakstan, in Oshibkina (ed.): 87–133.Google Scholar
Kosarev, M.F. 1996. Neolithic of Eastern Trans-Urals and Western Siberia, in Oshibkina (ed.): 253–69.Google Scholar
Kromer, B. & Becker, B. 1993. German oak and pine 14C calibration, 7200–9439 BC, Radiocarbon 35(1): 125–35.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kungurov, A.L. 1998. The multilayered settlement Ust-Vasikha 2 on the Upper Chumysh River, in Kirushin, Y.F. (ed.), Ancient settlements of the Altai: 39–53. Barnaul: Altai State University Press [in Russian).Google Scholar
Kuzmin, Y.V, & Jull, A.J.T. 1997. AMS radiocarbon dating of the Paleolithic-Neolithic transition in the Russian Far East, Current Research in the Pleistocene 14: 46–8.Google Scholar
Kuzmin, Y.V. & Orlova, L.A.. 1998. Radiocarbon chronology of the Siberian Paleolithic, Journal of World Prehistory 12(1): 1–53.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kuzmin, Y.V., Jull, A.J.T. Orlova, L.A. & Sulerzhitsky, L.D.. 1998. Radiocarbon chronology of the Stone Age cultures, Russian Far East, Radiocarbon 40(2): 675–86.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lapshina, Z.S. 1995. Early pottery on the Khummi site. Bulletin of the Far Eastern Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences 6 (6): 104–6 [in Russian].Google Scholar
Lebedintsev, A.I. 1990. The ancient maritime cultures of the Northwestern Sea of Okhotsk coast. Leningrad: Nauka [in Russian].Google Scholar
Mamonova, N. N. & Sulerzhitsky, L.D.. 1989. The C-14 dating of the Holocene burials from Cis-Baikal area, Soviet Archaeology 29(1): 19–32 [in Russian].Google Scholar
Michael, H.N. 1992. The Neolithic Cultures of Siberia and the Soviet Far East, in Ehrich, R.W. (ed.), Chronologies in Old World Archaeology 1: 416–29; 2: 405–17. Chicago (IL): University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Mochanov, Y.A. & Fedoseeva, S.A.. 1986. Main periods in the ancient history of northeast Asia, in Kontrimavichus, V.L. (ed.), Beringia in the Cenozoic Era (Russian Translation Series 28): 669–93. Rotterdam: A. A. Balkema.Google Scholar
Molodin, V.I. 1985. Problems of Mesolithic and Neolithic of the forest-steppe zone in Ob’-Irtysh watershed, in Martynov, A.I. (ed.), Archaeology of the southern Siberia: 3–17. Kemerovo: Kemerovo State University Press [in Russian].Google Scholar
Molodin, V.I. & Chikisheva, T.A.. 1996. The Neolithic burial ground of Korchugan, in Derevianko, A.P. & Molodin, V.I. (ed.), New archaeological and ethnographical discoveries in Siberia: 185–190. Novosibirsk: Institute of Archaeology & Ethnography Press [in Russian].Google Scholar
Okladnikov, A.P. 1970. Neolithic of Siberia and the Russian Far East, Materials and Research in Archaeology of the USSR 166: 172–93 [in Russian].Google Scholar
Okladnikov, A.P. & Medvedev, V.E.. 1983. The excavations of the multilayered site Gasya on the Lower Amur basin, Bulletin of the Siberian Branch of the USSR Academy of Sciences 20(1): 93–7 (in Russian].Google Scholar
Okladnikov, A.P. & Medvedev, V.E..1995. The Neolithic of southern Primorye (according to site excavations), in Choi, M.-R. (ed.), Ancient culture in Asia: 601–19. Seoul: Hakyeon Press [in Russian].Google Scholar
Orekhov, A.A. 1987. The ancient culture of the Northwestern coast of the Bering Sea. Moscow: Nauka [in Russian].Google Scholar
Orlova, L.A. 1995. Radiocarbon dating of the archaeological sites in Siberia and the Far East, in Derevianko, A.P. & Kholushkin, Y.P. (ed.), Methods of natural sciences in archaeological reconstructions: 207–32. Novosibirsk: Institute of Archaeology & Ethnography Press [in Russian].Google Scholar
Orlova, L.A. 1998. Radiocarbon dating of archaeological sites in Siberia and the Russian Far East. Part 2, in Derevianko, A.P. Kholushkin, Y.P. Rostovtsev, P.S. & Voronin, V.T., Statistical analysis of the Late Paleolithic complexes in Northern Asia (Supplement): 74–88. Novosibirsk: Novosibirsk State University Press [in Russian).Google Scholar
Oshibkina, S.V. (ed.) 1996. Neolithic of Northern Eurasia. Moscow: Nauka [in Russian].Google Scholar
Pearson, G.W., Becker, B. & Qua, F.. 1993. High-precision “C measurement of German and Irish oaks to show the natural “C variations from 7890 to 5000 BC, Radiocarbon 35(1): 93–104.Google Scholar
Polosmak, N.V., Chikisheva, T.A. & Balueva, T.S. 1989. Neolithic burial grounds of the Northern Baraba forest steppe. Novosibirsk: Nauka [in Russian].Google Scholar
Shevkümud, I. Y. 1997. New research concerning the Osipovskaya Culture in the Amur River Basin, Kokogaku Kenkyu [Quarterly of Archaeological Studies] 44 (3): 102–9 (in Japanese with English Abstract).Google Scholar
Slobodin, S.B. 1988. New Neolithic sites of the Upper Kolyma River basin, Bulletin of Regional Studies (Magadan) 15: 127–37 [in Russian].Google Scholar
Slobodin, S.B. 1999. Archaeological complexes of the Okhotsk-Kolyma Plateaux, in Vasilievsky, R.S. & Lebedintsev, A.I. (ed.), Materials and research of archaeology of the northern Far East and adjacent territories: 18–67. Magadan: Northeast Interdisciplinary Research Institute Press [in Russian].Google Scholar
Stuiver, M. & Reimer, P.J.. 1993. Extended 14C data base and revised CALIB 3.0 14C age calibration program, Radiocarbon 35(1): 215–30.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Suslov, S.P. 1961. Physical geography of Asiatic Russia. San Francisco (CA) & London: W. H. Freeman and Co.Google Scholar
Timofeev, V.I. & Zaitseva, G.I.. 1996. List of radiocarbon dates of the Neolithic, in Oshibkina (ed.): 337–48. Moscow: Nauka [in Russian].Google Scholar
Timofeev, V.I. & Zaitseva, G.I.. 1997. To the problem of radiocarbon chronology of the Neolithic of steppe and southern forest zones in European Russia and Siberia (review of sources), Archaeological Investigations (Institute of History of Material Culture, St Petersburg) 37: 98–108 [in Russian].Google Scholar
Van Der Plichi, J. 1993. The Groningen radiocarbon calibration program, Radiocarbon 35(1): 231–7.Google Scholar
Vasilievsky, R.S., Burilov, V. V. & Drozdov, N.I.. 1988. Archaeological sites of the northern Angara River basin. Novosibirsk: Nauka.Google Scholar
Vdovin, A.S. & Makarov, N.P. 1996. Mesolithic and Early Neolithic of the Kranoyarsk forest-steppe (problems of origin and development), in Kononenko, N.A. (ed.), Late Paleolithic-Early Neolithic of Eastern Asia and North America: 33–8. Viadivostok: Dalpress.Google Scholar
Veksler, V.S. 1989. Radiocarbon dates of Riga 2, Radiocarbon 31(1): 47–54.Google Scholar
Vetrov, V.M. 1995. Stone Age cultures of Upper Vitim: Early Ceramics, in Kajiwara (ed.): 31–5.Google Scholar
Vetrov, V.M., Berdnikova, N.E. Altukhov, V.V & Frolov, A.V.. 1995. The Makrushino burial ground: Early Neolithic complex, in Vetrov, V.M. (ed.), Baikalian Siberia in prehistory: 112–32. Irkutsk: Irkutsk State University Press [in Russian].Google Scholar
Weber, A.W. 1995. The Neolithic and Early Bronze Age of the Lake Baikal Region: A review of recent research, Journal of World Prehistory 9(2): 99–165.Google Scholar
Zaitseva, G.I. & Timofeev, V.I.. 1997. Radiocarbon dates of the Mesolithic-Copper Age of southern European Russian and Siberia, Annual Review of the Radiocarbon Laboratory, Institute of the History of Material Culture 2: 109–16 [in Russian).Google Scholar