Верхньопалеолітична стоянка Желонь на Овруцькому кряжі

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Date
2017
Authors
Залізняк, Леонід
Томашевський, А.
Переверзєв, С.
Сорокун, А.
Хоптинець, І.
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Abstract
У статті публікуються матеріали нової фінальнопалеолітичної стоянки Желонь, відкритої Овруцькою експедицією Інституту археології НАНУ на Овруцькому кряжі.
Description
The group of primitive hunter sites of the end of the glacial epoch was inspected on Ovruch plateau (Zhytomyr region) by expedition of the Institute of Archaeology of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine (IA NASU) in 2016 under the supervision of L. Zaliznyak. Zhelon, Zhelon 2, Zhelon 3, Gayevychi, Pyshchanytsia–Klinets, and Kozuly sites were discovered a few years before by East-Volhynia expedition of the IA NASU under the supervision of A. Tomashevsky. The sites are located in the north-eastern part of the Ovruch ridge on a plateau between the villages of Zhelon–Klinets–Pyshchanytsia. The concentrations of flint artifacts located on the surface of the arable land of the plateau which stretched out on 6–7 km along the north-eastern edge of the ridge above the road of Ovruch–Slovechno. The new perspective Kelembet site with expressive flint material collections of Epigravetian type was found and inspected by the expedition in 2016. The collection of archaeological materials increased the complexes of flint artifacts of the mentioned sites threefold, which allows publishing their flint collections. Numerous collections of the flint materials from the standard Zhelon site evidently demonstrates the typology specific of the flint industry of Upper Paleolithic sites of Ovruch region. Stone Age sites from the plateau surrounding the villages of Gayevychi, Zhelon, Pyshchanytsia gave the standard flint inventory of Epigravetian type. Of the same type of finds give grounds for a supposition that the sites were left by the same family groups of the hunting population, why periodically returned into the traditional places of the seasonal nomad camps. It is possible to assume that the sites are left by hunters for mammoths and other gregarious herbivorous of the Ice Age steppe. It can be proved by repeated finds of the proper fauna bone remains in the nearby sites with ravines. In particular, a known archaeologist I. Levicky found a mammoth tusk with an ingrained fir-tree decorative pattern in a ravine nearby Klinets village in the 20th cent. The geological position of flint artifacts (directly under the modern soil), as well as the typology of tools, permits to preliminary date the finds to Final Paleolithic time approximately 14–12 thousand years ago, the time of extinction of mammoths in Europe. One of the reasons of concentration of the sites on the plateau in the riverheads of the system of deep ravines in the region of villages Klinets–Pavlovychi is the deposits of flint raw materials on the bottom of the ravines. Earlier the sites on the Sonth edge of the ridge above the river of Norin (Dovhynychi, Zbranky, Sholomky, Korenivka sites) gravitated to the lower part of the same ravine system, which contained the flint raw materials for making instruments. There is a considerable typologic similarity of flint inventory and stratigraphy of the mentioned sites above the Norin river with the materials from nomad hunting camps on the plateau in the north-eastern part of the Ovruch ridge (Zhelon group of the sites). This gives grounds to talk not only about synchronousness and cultural similarity of the presently known Final Paleolithic sites of Ovruch region but also about their belonging to one original Ovruch local variant of Epigravetian, which dates to Final Paleolithic time, about 14–12 thousand years ago. The Epigravetian population from North Ukraine disappeared suddenly during the period of extinction of European mammoth population about 13–12 thousand years ago, not leaving genetic descendants. The historical fate of North Ukraine Epigravetian mammoth hunters remains an unsolved problem of the Paleolithic period of Ukraine.
Keywords
епіграветські мисливці на мамонта, крем’яна індустрія, Овруцький кряж, Желонь, верхньопалеолітична стоянка, epigravetian mammoth hunters, flint industry, Ovruch plateau, Zhelon, upper paleolithic sites
Citation
Верхньопалеолітична стоянка Желонь на Овруцькому кряжі / Залізняк Л. Л., Томашевський А. П., Переверзєв С. В., Сорокун А. А., Хоптинець І. М. // Магістеріум. - 2017. - Вип. 67 : Археологічні студії. - С. 11-18.