A preliminary climate-settlement framework for the last glacial cycle in Central Asia based on data from Kazakhstan

Summary

This is an abstract from the "Advances in Stone Age Archaeology of Central Asia" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Central Asia has emerged as a crucial locus for understanding recent human evolution in Eurasia. It is particularly important for understanding adaptation during dispersal, as it is both the locus of interaction among several archaic and modern human populations and, at the same time, a region that lies on the threshold of aridity. At times, it may have been a cold desert and could have presented a significant barrier to movement. In this paper, we summarize current possible correlations between settlement and climate in this region, based on sedimentological, vegetation, and faunal data, as well as the chronology of archaeological sites recently investigated during the PALAEOSILKROAD project. Contrary to expectations, it appears that modern humans, at least, were present in here even during relatively colder periods characterized by high wind intensity and low precipitation. Current data point to a relatively sparse human signal, however, which remains to be explained. In this context, we also discuss biases and gaps in the archaeological record and compare them with the record of neighboring countries, such as Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan. We conclude by outlining the necessary steps to a better understanding of the human-environmental framework of the last glacial cycle in Central Asia.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 90th Annual Meeting, Denver, CO (2025)   •
• Advances in Stone Age Archaeology of Central Asia

Keywords

Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 51361