Radiocarbon chronology and environment of woolly mammoth ( Mammuthus primigenius Blum.) in northern Asia: results and perspectives

Abstract

This paper reviews the history of the woolly mammoth ( Mammuthus primigenius Blum.) in Siberia and adjacent northern Asia. The particular emphases are the chronology and environment of mammoth existence and extinction, based on about 530 radiocarbon dates from about 230 localities with mammoth remains and palaeoenvironmental records of the last 50,000 years. Until ca. 12,000 radiocarbon years ago (BP), mammoths inhabited all of northern Asia, from the High Arctic to southern Siberia and northeastern China. Since ca. 12,000 BP, mammoth disappeared from major parts of Siberia and adjacent northern Asia, and survived mainly in the Arctic regions of Siberia, north of 69° northern latitude. However, recently, it was found that some mammoth populations continued to exist in central and southern Western Siberia until ca. 11,100–10,200 BP. ‘Normal’ size mammoths became extinct in mainland Siberia at the Pleistocene–Holocene boundary, ca. 9700 BP. On Wrangel Island in the High Arctic, small-sized mammoths survived into the Middle–Late Holocene, ca. 7700–3700 BP. Compared with previous studies, it is now possible to reveal the complex nature of the process of final mammoth extinction in Siberia, with some small populations surviving outside of the Arctic until ca. 10,000 BP. The extinction of mammoth was most probably caused by a combination of factors, such as global warming in the Late Glacial (since ca. 15,000 BP) and the disintegration of landscapes suitable for mammoths throughout the Upper Pleistocene, such as light forests with vast open spaces occupied by meadows and forest tundra. The expansion of forest vegetation after the Last Glacial Maximum in Siberia, including its northeastern part, created unsuitable habitats for herbivorous megafauna, especially for mammoths. However, the Holocene environment of Wrangel Island was not of ‘glacial’ type and this requires further studies. The relationship between mammoths and Upper Palaeolithic humans is also considered. The role of humans in the process of mammoth extinction was of secondary importance. The lack of direct evidences of mammoth hunting limits the estimation of its role in Upper Palaeolithic human subsistence. Siberia is undoubtedly the area where the final extinction of mammoth occurred, and the future study of this process is important to understand the patterns of Pleistocene megafaunal extinction in the Northern Hemisphere.