New AMS Dating of Bone and Antler Weapons from the Shigir Collections Housed in the Sverdlovsk Regional Museum, Urals, Russia

Abstract

This paper presents new AMS dating of organic finds from the Shigir (Shigirsky) peat bog, located in the Sverdlovsk Province, Kirovgrad District of the Urals. The bog is located immediately south of the river Severnaya Shuraly, with the Urals to the west. Intermittent survey and excavation has been undertaken at this location since 1879, resulting in the recovery of in excess of 3000 cultural artefacts, including oars, sculptures of birds, snake figurines, wooden skis, arrowheads, and fish hooks. The dates presented here indicate that not only is there a long duration of human use of the wetlands at Shigir, but that the artefact forms also appear to have a significant duration of use throughout the earlier prehistoric periods considered here.