Sosruco Rockshelter: revision of materials of the excavation by S.N. Zamiatnin and the Upper Horizons Radiocarbon Chronology

Abstract

Recently new investigations of Sosruko site have been conducted. Unfortunately, the materials of the site have not been interpreted in the proper way. The main task of the article is to clarify the origin of stone industries of the Sosruko complexes. We suggest that complexes of the Layers M1 and M2 are related to the Kobuleti Culture of the Transcaucasia. This cultural phenomenon appeared in beginning of the 10th millennium BC as a result of the migration of the carriers of the M’lefaat Culture from the Middle East. Transcaucasia was not the end point of the M’lefaatian migration. Its further expansion resulted to the appearance of the Kukrek Culture in the Steppe zone of Ukraine and Moldova. The common elements of this material culture include the usage of pressing flaking, the presence of bullet-like cores, backed bladelets, bilateral burins, and the sporadic usage of microburin technique for manufacturing of the truncated facetted points. Some of the late materials from the M1 layer are associated with the Darkveti culture of the Transcaucasus. This culture appeared at the beginning of Boreal. The migration of carriers of the Darkveti Culture to Eastern Europe, which started in the 8th millennium BC, led to formation of the Matveev Kurgan and Grebeniki Cultures in the basins of Don, Dnieper, South Bug and Dniester. The common elements of these three cultures are the presence of the flat one- or two-platform monofrontal cores for obtaining the pressing blades and bladelets, symmetric trapezes. The materials from the layers M3 and M4 of Sosruko site demonstrate complete similarity with the Shan-Koba Culture of the Final Pleistocene – Early Holocene. The connection of the Shan-Koba Culture with the Karein B Culture in the South-West of Asia Minor is also considered. We see the similar geometric complexes in both cultures, the presence of low trapezes, symmetric lunates, triangles. Carriers of both cultures use the microburin technique for geometric microliths manufacturing. The migration of the Asia Minor inhabitants began during Bølling interstadial. The migrants reached the Central Caucasus in Allerød. The migration flows at the end of Pleistocene and the beginning of Holocene were the prelude of the Neolithization processes of Eastern Europe and Transcaucasia. The Shan-Kobian migration started a succession of movements of the Near East and Middle East populations to the East Europe and to Caucasus. The migrations of the carriers of the M’lefaat (Kobuleti) and Darkveti cultures led to the appearance of the global zones of informational continuity (Cultural-Historical Regions) in the frames of which the Neolithic innovations were spread in the area. The materials from the Sosruko Grotto give us an opportunity to reveal the chronology of the very beginning phases of the Neolithization in Eastern Europe.