Pages:  61-83 | DOI: https://doi.org/10.55086/sp2616183

Multilayered Middle Palaeolithic site Ilskaya 1 in the foothills of the Northwestern Caucasus has been known for more than 125 years. However, it still remains inadequately explored. Its stratigraphy, age and cultural affinity are unclear. The present paper is devoted to the main problem in the study of the Ilskaya site — the problem of its stratigraphy and age. After analyzing S. N. Zamiatnin’s, V. A. Gorodtsov’s, N. D. Praslov’s and other researchers’ views on this subject, the authors provide new evidence obtained in the course of recent geological works on the site. They argue that nearly the whole thickness of the site deposits, consisting of alluvial and deluvial sediments with three paleosols, can be dated to MIS 5. The lowermost cultural layer, associated with with the lower paleosol, corresponds to MIS 5e and dates from the end of Mikulino/Salyn’ interglacial (~120 kya). The overlying lithological and cultural layers (excepting the uppermost ones) beong to the Early Valdai time, substages 5d-a.

Keywords: Middle Palaeolithic, Late Pleistocene, MIS 5, Ilskaya 1 site, Northwestern Caucasus

Information about authors:

Vyacheslav Shchelinsky (Saint Petersburg, Russian Federation). Doctor of Historical Sciences. Institute for the History of Material Culture of the Russian Academy of Sciences. Dvortsovaya Emb., 18, Saint Petersburg, 191186, Russian Federation
E-mail: [email protected]
ORCID: 0000-0002-2131-1292

Maxim Minaev (Ilsky, Russian Federation). “EcoDesant”. Lenin St, 155, Ilsky urban locality, Seversky District, Krasnodar Krai, 353230, Russian Federation