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   

New Craniometric Evidence on the Origin of the Karelians (the Kylalahti Kalmistomäki Burial Ground)

V.I. Khartanovich and I.G. Shirobokov.

In 2006–2007, the expedition from Peter the Great Museum of Anthropology and Ethnography, St. Petersburg excavated 52 inhumation burials at a 13th-14th- century cemetery in Kylalahti Kalmistomäki, Karelia. The burial goods are unusual for Karelia, eastern Finland, or other parts of northwestern Russia. The skeletal remains provide the fi rst chance of assessing the biological affi nities of the medieval “Korela.” The group displays a trait combination similar to that observed in modern Karelians and opposing them to other recent Eurasian populations. The same combination is observed in Mesolithic and Neolithic crania from the Eastern Baltic. The Kylalahti Kalmistomäki series supports the hypothesis stating that features of the early inhabitants of Europe have survived in certain populations of northwestern Eurasia up to the present time.

Keywords: Craniology, population history, ethnic history, Middle Ages, Finnic peoples, Karelians.