Two lines of the development of Early Neolithic ceramics in the Transural-Ob region

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Abstract

The paper discusses two lines of the development of early Neolithic pottery of the 7th–6th millennia BC in the Trans-Ural-Ob region. The first of them is represented by the Trans-Ural Koshkino and Kozlovo (Koksharovsky-Yurino) cultures, the second one – by the taiga Amnya, Kayukovo, Mulymya, Satyga types and the forest-steppe Baraba culture. The first is characterized by ware with a round bottom, decorated only with the retreating-stroke ornamentation (the Koshkino culture), or with subordinate use of comb impressions (the Kozlovo culture). A bright marker of the second line is flat-bottomed ware, also ornamented in the incised (retreating)-stroke technique with the presence of vessels with a round bottom and comb ornamentation in a number of archaeological cultural types. The Mergen archaeological complex of the northern forest-steppe part of the Lower Ishim region was the contact zone of these ceramic traditions. Moreover, two types of sites render bright features to the early Neolithic in the Trans-Urals and Western Siberia. The first is the sanctuaries represented in the mountain-forest Trans-Urals and the northern taiga zone of Western Siberia by «sacrificial hills» and a ritual ground fenced with a U-shaped ditch with various sacrificial objects of the Baraba site of Ust-Tartas-1 in the forest-steppe Ob region. The second type of sites, new for the Neolithic of Northern Eurasia, includes fortified settlements, which are recorded only in the taiga zone of the Lower and Middle Ob region. The most famous of them are Amnya I and Kayukovo 2. The emergence of these innovations in the prehistoric societies of the region could not be caused only be an influence from outside. In many ways, they were determined by the very course of progressive development of the ancient communities in the Trans-Ural-Ob region, which entered a new historical era, the Neolithic (in the archaeological periodization terms) or the late kin community (in the Russian periodization of the prehistoric society).

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About the authors

A. F. Shorin

Institute of History and Archaeology of the Ural Branch of the RAS

Author for correspondence.
Email: shorin_af@mail.ru
Russian Federation, Yekaterinburg

Anastasia A. Shorina

Institute of History and Archaeology of the Ural Branch of the RAS

Email: aashor@mail.ru
Russian Federation, Yekaterinburg

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2. Fig. 1. A distribution map for the main Early Neolithic sites of the Koshkino type and with flat-bottomed pottery in the Trans-Urals-West Siberian region.

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3. Fig. 2. Vessels of the Early Neolithic period of the Trans-Urals. Koksharovsky Hill: 1–3 – Kozlovo (Koksharovsky-Yurino) type, 4–6 – Koshkino type.

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4. Fig. 3. Vessels from the Early Neolithic period of the taiga and forest-steppe Ob region: 1 – Kayukovo type, 2–4 – Amnya type, 5–6 – Baraba culture.

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5. Fig. 4. Vessels from the Early Neolithic period of the taiga Ob region and the Mergen archaeological region: 1, 2 – Mulymya type, 3, 4 – early Boborykino type, 5 – Kayukovo type, 6 – Koshkino type.

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