Shuteleva I.   Golyeva A.   Shcherbakov N.  

Multi-proxy analysis of the archaeological material of karst lakes in the Southern Urals

Reporter: Shcherbakov N.

Currently, the greatest focus of attention of archaeologists is directed to the study of archeological sites. The territories adjacent to them are not always studied using complex natural science methods as a heritage site itself. The use of the same range of analyzes of the frontier territories of an archeological sites allows us to significantly expand its characteristics. The object of the study was the area adjacent to Glumilino-1, a settlement located on the territory of Ufa, on the high right bank of the river Ufa, territorially correlated with the forest-steppe zone of the Southern Urals. Glumilino-1, the settlement culturally and chronologically correlates with the Kara-Abyz culture of the early Iron Age and the Romanov type of the Imenkovskaya cultural group. Multi-proxy research methods are associated with the interaction of archaeological and archeology-independent research methods. Such as soil science, osteology, geology, etc.
In the course of the study of the territory adjacent to Glumilino-1, a settlement, a site with a variety of archaeological material, previously occupied by an ancient karst lake, was explored. This phenomenon is typical for the territory of the Southern Urals, a zone of karst distribution, where lakes of karst-erosion origin are almost as common as oxbow lakes. This type of shallow, up to 10 m, lakes formed on the site of karst funnels filled with water from underground sources. A characteristic feature of reservoirs of this type is the periodic formation of ponor karst funnels at the bottom, through which water flows to the underlying layers, then the bottom silts up and the lake is filled with water again. The studied area corresponds to a lake with a depth of about three meters. However, it was formed not in a karst funnel, but in a karst fissure stretched longitudinally along the root terrace. In the course of soil analysis, one-stage water withdrawal was established, which is characterized by the fact that the process of soil burial was abrupt, one-stage. The alluvial layers of the paleo lake are extremely informative not only in terms of the preserved fragments of ancient artifacts that ended up under the mirror of the lake for various reasons, but also in terms of the content of the chemical composition of the soil, which illustrates the change in the paleoclimate in this area. Despite the presence of archaeological material, morphological and chemical analyzes of soils in sections, signs of the cultural layer were not found.
Archaeological material correlated with the historical period of the 19th - 20th centuries was localized at the moment when the lake ceased to exist and lie above it. Historical maps, land surveying materials of the 19th - early 20th centuries. there are no more water bodies in this area. On the contrary, fragments of ceramics and stone implements of the Neolithic and Late Bronze Ages, as well as the clothing complex of the Early Iron Age and the Early Middle Ages, represented by fragments of ceramics, ferrous metal products, lie at different depths and do not form a single layer.