New Dental Finds Associated with the Paleolithic Selenga Culture, Western Trans-Baikal Region

Abstract

We describe human teeth discovered in 2012 during the re-examination of the collection from Ust-Kyakhta-3 in the western Trans-Baikal region, excavated by A.P. Okladnikov. This is one of the key Final Paleolithic sites in this area, having a distinct twolayer stratigraphy, a non-contradictory series of radiocarbon dates, and the largest (and the most representative) collection of artifacts. Human teeth come from layer 1, whose dates range from 11,505 ± 100 to 12,151 ± 58 BP. Finds include fragments of a deciduous left upper second molar of a child aged 11–13 and an incompletely erupted upper permanent molar, possibly of the same child. Morphological comparison of these teeth with those from Malta in the Cis-Baikal region demonstrates considerable similarity. The fi nding suggests that the populations of Malta and Ust-Kyakhta-3 represent one and the same southern Siberian Upper Paleolithic dental complex.