Upper Paleolithic site Tuyana – a multi-proxy record of sedimentation and environmental history during the Late Pleistocene and Holocene in the Tunka rift valley, Baikal region

Abstract

The complex study of the 3.5-m thick section of the multi-genetic sediments of the Late Paleolithic Tuyana site (Tunka rift valley, Baikal region) resulted in a first detailed record of the change in environment and climate of the ancient humans’ habitation in the Tunka rift valley in Late Pleistocene and Holocene in the interval of >36 ka cal BP until Late Holocene. Sedimentation processes in the section are characterized by multiple remobilizations. Redeposition traces are most strongly expressed in МIS 3 sediments. Apparently, an intensive transient removal of slope sediments took place here at МIS 2. The common tendency of the natural environment and habitation conditions of the ancient humans in the Tunka valley show domination of the open and relatively dry tundra-steppe with areas of forests vegetation in the end of MIS 3, mostly dry steppes with limited forest-tundra and tundra associations in MIS 2 with the spread of boreal taiga in Holocene. Tunka rift valley around 50 ka cal BP had already been settled by humans and was visited by them during the periods of relatively favorable climatic conditions: during the MIS 3 optimums and in Middle Holocene. The Tuyana Paleolithic complexes have extensive analogies with the Aurignacian industries of Eurasia. The closest similarities could be drawn with the complexes of Kulbulakien culture in Middle Asia and Kazakhstan. The Tuyana site is currently the most eastern occurrence of the Aurignacian culture in Eurasia.