Evidence for Middle Palaeolithic occupation and landscape change in central Armenia at the open-air site of Alapars-1

Abstract

Here we report the findings from excavations at the open-air Middle Palaeolithic site of Alapars-1 in central Armenia. Three stratified Palaeolithic artefact assemblages were found within a 6-m-thick alluvial-aeolian sequence, located on the flanks of an obsidian-bearing lava dome. Combined sedimentological and chronological analyses reveal three phases of sedimentation and soil development. During Marine Oxygen Isotope Stages 5–3, the manner of deposition changes from alluvial to aeolian, with a development of soil horizons. Techno-typological analysis and geochemical sourcing of the obsidian artefacts reveal differential discard patterns, source exploitation, and artefact densities within strata, suggesting variability in technological organization during the Middle Palaeolithic. Taken together, these results indicate changes in hominin occupation patterns from ephemeral to more persistent in relation to landscape dynamics during the last interglacial and glacial periods in central Armenia.

Short-term occupations at high elevation during the Middle Paleolithic at Kalavan 2 (Republic of Armenia)

“…This raw material movement suggests contacts with other Late Pleistocene hominins. The source area of Gutansar and Hatis, was the most frequented and was shared with MP occupants of other sites such as Lusakert Cave 1 and Alapars-1 [14,16] (Fig 12). The source of Pokr Arteni is located 1-2 km from the MP site of Barozh 12 [7,8,30].…”

“…The lithic evidence from the layer dated to the end of MIS 4 (ca. 65 ka) was interpreted as demonstrating greater occupational intensity in comparison to the MIS 5 occupation amidst a climatic shift [16]. At the site of Hovk 1 (2040 m asl), sporadic evidence of human occupation over a long period of time ca.…”

“…Our current knowledge of hominin occupation and settlement dynamics in the southern Caucasus and Armenian highlands during the last 250 ka has many temporal and spatial gaps, as few eco-geographic sub-regions have been studied intensively [4,5] (Fig 1). However, the majority of the Middle and Upper Paleolithic sites (MP and UP) are dated to~65-30 ka (late Marine Isotope Stages (MIS) 4 up to 2) [4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16]. The environmental conditions during this time interval indicated by regional long-term climatic records were characterized by abrupt, millennial-scale temperature and precipitation oscillations between cold (stadial) and warm (interstadial) stages [17][18][19][20][21][22][23][24][25].…”

“…The second research area is located around Yerevan in the Hrazdan River valley in Armenia ranging from ca. 900 m asl at Yerevan -1 cave [4,27,28], and Lusakert-1 cave at 1420 m asl [14,15,29] and Alapars-1 at 1774 m asl [16]. Other sites have been found in diverse biomes (e.g., Barozh 12 at 1336 m asl [7,8,30] or elevation settings (e.g., the low-elevation site of Bagratashen 1 at 457 m asl m asl [12].…”

The past in dust: current trends and future directions in Pleistocene geoarcheology of European loess

“…However, grain‐size is not only analyzed in pure sediment research, but often applied as a component of geoarcheological investigations (e.g. Chu et al ., 2018; Marković et al ., 2021b; Malinsky‐Buller et al ., 2021). For instance, the importance of an in‐depth understanding of the loess stratigraphy before any paleoenvironmental proxy interpretation has been emphasized for the Krems‐Wachtberg site (Austria; Sprafke et al ., 2020) where grain‐size analysis allowed a differentiation between eolian sediments and those reworked by slope processes.…”