Investigating the Eolian Context of the Last Glacial Maximum Occupation at Kawanishi‐C, Hokkaido, Japan

Abstract

As debates about the late Pleistocene human occupation of northeast Asia continue, the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM) prehistory of Hokkaido becomes more relevant. A geoarchaeological evaluation of key sites on the island will provide important evidence to understand human adaptive responses to LGM environments. Kawanishi‐C is located on the middle terrace of the Satsunai River, eastern Hokkaido. Previous salvage excavations totaling 5756 m2 revealed three archaeological layers in eolian sediments: (1) an early Jomon component above the Ta‐d tephra (∼7000 cal. yr B.P.), (2) a microblade component between the Ta‐d and En‐a tephras (∼15,000 cal. yr B.P.), and (3) a blade/flake‐based assemblage between the En‐a and Spfa‐1 tephras (27,000–25,000 cal. yr B.P.). Integration of geoarchaeological investigations and statistical analysis of the artifacts’ spatial distribution indicates that the relatively low energy eolian matrix preserved the site's behavioral context, though some post‐depositional agent, such as frost heaving, may have slightly displaced the artifacts vertically.

Palaeobotanical records from Rebun Island and their potential for improving the chronological control and understanding human–environment interactions in the Hokkaido Region, Japan

“…calibrated or calendar years before present, where ‘present’ is conventionally taken as 1950) as suggested by Izuho and Sato (2007). Some authors argue that Upper Palaeolithic groups migrated from Siberia (Izuho et al, 2014 and references therein) via a land bridge, which connected Hokkaido with Sakhalin and the northeast Asian mainland during most of the Last Glacial period (Kuzmin et al, 2002). Palaeolithic exchange networks extended at least as far as southern Sakhalin/Hokkaido (Kuzmin et al, 2013).…”

Cold adaptation in Upper Paleolithic hunter-gatherers of eastern Eurasia

“…3), in the warming Japanese archipelago, the descendants of UP hunter-gatherers who had survived the ice age went to shape the Jomon culture, epitomized by its distinctive pottery (28). Moreover, the absence of recovery of the effective population size in the Hokkaido Jomon lineage is consistent with the line of cultural evidence (9,25,29,30), indicating a decrease in the intensity of cultural occupation in Hokkaido around 15,000 ya. Our findings are supported by archaeological evidence from the UP in the Japanese archipelago during this period (see Supplementary text).…”

“…Hokkaido, now an island, was certainly connected to the East Eurasian continent at the mouth of Amur River, forming the Paleo-Sakhalin Hokkaido Kurile Peninsula (PSHK) (Fig. 1) (8,9). Cultural evidence indicates that the appearance of Homo sapiens equipped with small flake-based assemblage dates to ~38,000 yr cal BP on P-Honshu Island (10,11).…”

A functional approach to the use of the earliest blade technology in Upper Paleolithic Hokkaido, northern Japan

“…A total of 6,856 m 2 were uncovered in three excavation campaigns conducted by the archaeologists affiliated with the Obihiro Board of Education (Kitazawa et al, 1998(Kitazawa et al, , 2000Kitazawa, 2000). Three archaeological layers identified within the eolian units classified from top to bottom as the Jomon assemblage in the black humus soil above the Tarumae-D tephra (Ta-d, 7,000 cal yr BP), the microblade assemblage in an eolian loam between the Ta-d and En-a (17,000-15,000 cal yr BP) tephras, as well as the blade assemblage in an eolian loam between the En-a and Spfa-1 (45,000-40,000 cal yr BP) tephras 0.7m below the surface (Kitazawa et al, 1998;Izuho et al, 2014).…”

“…Among these, four dates have been securely obtained from the hearths, reported as 21,780 ± 09 14 C yr BP, 21,420 ± 190 14 C yr BP 21,710 ± 07 14 C yr BP, 21,480 ± 120 14 C yr BP, and their calibrated dates are fallen in 26,190 -25,330 cal yr BP. The integration of geoarchaeological and statistical analyses of the artifacts' spatial distribution in the lower occupation of Kawanishi C shows that post-depositional disturbance slightly displaced the artifacts vertically, suggesting that low-energy eolian sediments are enough to preserve potential data on site-scale human behavior (Nakazawa, 2007;Izuho et al, 2014).…”