title: Late Mousterian persistence near the Arctic Circle.
abstract: Palaeolithic sites in Russian high latitudes have been considered as Upper Palaeolithic and thus representing an Arctic expansion of modern humans. Here we show that at Byzovaya, in the western foothills of the Polar Urals, the technological structure of the lithic assemblage makes it directly comparable with Mousterian Middle Palaeolithic industries that so far have been exclusively attributed to the Neandertal populations in Europe. Radiocarbon and optical-stimulated luminescence dates on bones and sand grains indicate that the site was occupied during a short period around 28,500 carbon-14 years before the present (about 31,000 to 34,000 calendar years ago), at the time when only Upper Palaeolithic cultures occupied lower latitudes of Eurasia. Byzovaya may thus represent a late northern refuge for Neandertals, about 1000 km north of earlier known Mousterian sites.
authors.affiliation: CNRS, UMR 5608, TRACES, Université de Toulouse le Mirail, Maison de la Recherche, 5 Allées Antonio Machado, 31058 Toulouse Cedex 9, France. slimak@univ-tlse2.fr
authors.forename: Ludovic
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Slimak
authors.forename: John Inge
authors.initials: JI
authors.lastname: Svendsen
authors.forename: Jan
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Mangerud
authors.forename: Hugues
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Plisson
authors.forename: Herbjørn Presthus
authors.initials: HP
authors.lastname: Heggen
authors.forename: Alexis
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Brugère
authors.forename: Pavel Yurievich
authors.initials: PY
authors.lastname: Pavlov
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001106:Archaeology; D001110:Arctic Regions; D005843:Geography; D015186:Hominidae; D006801:Humans; D012426:Russia; D053001:Tool Use Behavior