Archaeology, Ethnology & Anthropology of Eurasia 42 (1) 2014

Annotation:  The Pleistocene Peopling of the North: Paleolithic Milestones and Thresholds Horizons in Northern Eu The Levallois Mousterian Assemblages of Sindh (Pakistan) and Their Relations with the Middle Paleol Chronology of the Uralian Neolithic The Late Krotovo (Cherno-Ozerye) Culture in the Irtysh Forest-Steppe, Western Siberia An Experimental Study of Percussion Technologies in the Minusinsk Basin: Percussion and Tool Types Prehistoric Wars and the Origin of Military Power (Based on Archaeological and Historical- Ethnolog Anthropomorphic Wooden Figures from the Trans-Urals Images on Metal Ware: The Graphic Art of Northwestern Siberia and the Cis-Urals Seventeenth Century Moscow Tiles in Russia Female Ornaments of the Xiongnu-Xianbei Age from Ulug-Choltukh, the Edigan River Valley, Gorny Alta Kayakers Near Scotland’s Northern Shores at the Turn of the 17th–18th Centuries: Main Theories of O Bichura Village (Transbaikalia): Foundation and Population Growth (18th–Late 20th Century) Trepanation Among the Early Nomads of Gorny Altai: A Multidisciplinary Study On the Biological Distinctness of the Pit-Grave (Yamnaya) People in the Northwestern Caspian: Crania   

The Pleistocene Peopling of the North: Paleolithic Milestones and Thresholds Horizons in Northern Eurasia. Part I: Lower Paleolithic Antecedents

N. Rolland.

Human occupation of northern Eurasia high latitudes entailed coping with severe bioclimatic circumstances and Ice Age cycle fl uctuations. Resolving this “adaptability paradox” required depending on cultural, rather than biological means. Paleolithic evidence indicates culture historical developments of considerable time depth, long-term adaptive stages, and thresholds in the “peopling of the North.” It began with Lower Paleolithic populations expanding into temperate and continental Eurasia, becoming fully actualized during the Middle and Upper Paleolithic. The Middle Paleolithic formative stage constituted a human biogeographic realm overlapping signifi cantly with the Mammoth-Steppe Biome faunal complex. Part I identifi es issues, time perspectivism, culture, foraging adaptation, and human biogeography concepts. Lower Paleolithic occurrences, initial occupation episodes are surveyed and discussed.

Keywords: Adaptive constraints, culture, time perspectivism, Mammoth-Steppe Biome, early dispersals evidence.