Stone Age people might have made expanded oceanic journeys on the Caspian Ocean, as per another review distributed in the journal Open Antiquarianism.
The study looked at ornamental beads made from disk-shaped cockle shells (Didacna sp.). discovered near the eastern Caspian Sea shoreline at the Kaylu rock shelter, a burial ground resembling a cave.
During the late Mesolithic and Neolithic periods, Stone Age people made extensive use of kaylu. Because it is analogous to the transition between hunter-gatherer and herding and farming cultures that took place approximately 11,500 years ago in the region, this transition is particularly significant in the evolution of human cultural practices. Even though Kaylu was excavated in the middle of the 20th century, its deposits were poorly described, and it wasn’t until 2018 that they were thoroughly reevaluated and directly dated.
To figure out how the beads were made and used in this study, lead author Solange Rigaud of the CNRS and the University of Bordeaux in France and her colleagues used a wide range of tools and methods. Analyses using scanning electron microscopy (SEM), morphometry, microscopic analysis, and spectrometry revealed a distinct stylistic shift between the beads worn by the first farmers and the last hunter-gatherers.
The variety of personal ornaments found at Jeitun, Turkmenistan, during the early Neolithic period. Credit: Open Archaeology (2023). DOI: 10.1515/opar-2022-0289
The analyses also made it possible for the researchers to compare the beads found at Kaylu to those from other locations in the region. Beads from the Neolithic that were found in the northern, eastern, and western parts of the Caspian Sea differed sufficiently from those that were found in the southern part to suggest that they traveled a different path for the spread of culture.
It is well established that farmers and herders traveled through what is now northern Iran along a route through the southern Caspian Sea to spread farming techniques and technologies. The findings of Rigaud suggest that cultural practices spread throughout the northern Caspian Sea coastline independently of the inland route.
However, another intriguing explanation is that Stone Age people used the Caspian Sea for maritime travel. According to Rigaud, “the rapid circulation of specific bead types—along with people, information, knowledge, and symbols—from either side of the Caspian Sea by long maritime voyages may have been granted by seafaring contacts between these communities.”
More information: Solange Rigaud et al, Exploring Hypotheses on Early Holocene Caspian Seafaring Through Personal Ornaments: A Study of Changing Styles and Symbols in Western Central Asia, Open Archaeology (2023). DOI: 10.1515/opar-2022-0289
