Методологические исследования Г. И. Медведева

Abstract

The article deals with the methodological concept of the Siberian archaeologist G. I. Medvedev. The central element of his thoughts was the analysis of the features of the archaeological material. He thought quite original for his time, questioning the main thesis of Soviet archaeology about an archaeological object as an objective source of sociohistorical information. The artifact indicates only the fact of the activity and the time of stay of the subjects of the ancient society, and also provides information about the “physically reliable” parameters. It turns out that any social reconstructions, even of the functions of fossil artifacts, are conjectural, and sometimes fantastic. The rationale for this conclusion is based on an understanding of the specific conditions for the formation of artifacts. This conclusion logically led to the interest of Medvedev, a scientist and methodologist, in the question of how to ensure the reliability of the knowledge produced by archaeologists. His research in this area led him to the project “geoarchaeology”. Medvedev's methodological concept has been formed for several decades and has been presented in scientific papers of different years. In the 1970s, the author and a group of like-minded people in the archaeological laboratory of the Irkutsk State University accumulated experience in conducting morphological and technological studies of stone and ceramics, offered justification for their compliance with the features of archaeological sites. In the candidate's and then doctoral dissertations, practical experience was collected and comprehended, some theoretical ideas were formulated. Even then, Medvedev identified two areas of his research – geoarchaeological and cultural-historical, dividing them not only by subject, but also by the degree of reliability of the results. In the 1990s and 2000s, there was a comprehension and theoretical formulation of the concept of geoarchaeology, which Medvedev considered as a condition for overcoming the difficulties of archaeological knowledge, achieving reliability, objectivity, and reliability of the knowledge produced. The elements of this concept can be considered the definition of geoarchaeology as a science, the definition of its subject area and cognitive boundaries, the analysis of geoarchaeological objects and directions of their study, the identification of the structure and methods of research, the concept of “recognition threshold”, the steps of presenting the author's conclusions.