On the Dating the Posyolok Imeni Frunze Site (Krasnogorskoe District, Altai Krai)

Abstract

This article discusses relative dating of the evidence from the Posyolok imeni Frunze site, collected in 1976 near the settlement of the same name by archaeologist B. I. Lapshin from Biysk. The assemblage lacked cores or expressive products of their reduction, while spalls and debitage dominated among the finds. The tool assemblage consisted of eight items and included two adzes, chopper, heavy pointed tool with traces of abrasive utilization, scraper, two retouched flakes, and a fragment of a retouched artifact. Finegrained sedimentary rock which had undergone intense post-depositional weathering was used as primary raw material at the site. Specific features of the industry (presence of polished adzes, underdeveloped prismatic reduction, absence of burins) suggest the Late Neolithic age for the site, which contradicts the established trend in the literature to attribute the assemblage to the Upper Paleolithic. The heavy pointed tool was interpreted as a hoe or ice pick. Its closest parallels appear in the Neolithic assemblages from the Aley River and Barnaul Ob region. The assemblage also included some spalls removed by soft organic hammer.