Archaeology, Ethnology & Anthropology of Eurasia 38 (1) 2010

Annotation:  Siliceous Rock of the Southern Urals: Distribution and Usage in the Stone Age Periods, Boundaries, and Contact Zones in the Far Eastern Insular World of the Neolithic (Based on Oyster Cultivation and Archaeology as Producing Activities Early Iron Age Dyupsya Burial, Central Yakutia The “Osmium Trace” in Mineral Inclusions in Ancient Gold Artifacts Social Structure of the Early Medieval Population in the Upper Kama Region (Based on Evidence from t Bronze Helmet Recently Discovered in Mongolia The Matchmaker’s Staffs from Fort Nadym of the 17th–18th Centuries Dendrochronological Survey of the Towers from the Kazym Ostrog Dendrochronological Dating of the Groundsill for the Bell Tower of the Spasskaya Church in Irkutsk Marriages among the Tobol-Irtysh Tatars in the Late 18th – Early 20th Centuries The Altai Cossacks in the 18th – Early 20th Centuries ANTHROPOL A Fossil Human Humerus from Khvalynsk: Morphology and Taxonomy Skeletal Remains from Buston VI – a Sapalli Culture Cemetery in Uzbekistan New Craniometric Evidence on the Origin of the Karelians (the Kylalahti Kalmistomäki Burial Ground) The Maikop Crania Revisited   

Periods, Boundaries, and Contact Zones in the Far Eastern Insular World of the Neolithic (Based on the Radiocarbon Chronology of Sites on the Sakhalin and Kuril Islands)

A.A. Vasilevski, V.A. Grischenko, and L.A. Orlova.

In the present article, a full summary of radiocarbon dates of Neolithic sites in Sakhalin and the Kuril Islands is used to elaborate a periodization of archaeological cultures in the Russian Far East. Materials assembled over recent years make it possible to reconstruct patterns of human adaptation to the changing Holocene environment, economic activities, and the exploitation of natural resources. Shifts in the boundaries of cultural zones are traced and migrations in a meridional direction are reconstructed.

Keywords: Neolithic, Sakhalin, Kuril Islands, radiocarbon dating, Far Eastern islands, exploitation of the environment, adaptation, contact zones.