Stone raw material from the late Paleolithic location Shikaevka-2

The Results of the pétrographie analysis of raw materials the artifacts from location Shikayevka-2 in the western part of the West Siberian Plain are given in the publication. At first the definition of stone raw materials was called by V.T. Petrin flint. Then he named it a green-red jasper of the South Ural origin. G.N. Matyushin also believed that the artifacts from Shikayevka-2 were made of the South Ural jasper which closest ways out are found on the southern coast of the Karabalykty lake (the Abzelilovsky district of the Republic of Bashkortostan). Such interpretation of these stone raw material as import and the conclusions about ways of migration of the ancient population is based in the first, for lack of comparison with material of possible local sources of stone raw materials, especially pebble; secondly, in ambiguity of the term “jasper”. This explains the need for a more careful petrographic study of raw material artifacts of late Paleolithic location Shikayevka-2. We studied 30 artifacts. All of them are made of similarfine-grained high-silicon rocks (hardness H = 6,5-7,0), well translucent in thin edges chipping and burrs, color difference which are bound together with transitions. We didn't observe contrasting color combinations, which could be attributed to the “red-green”, “wax green” and distinctly “green” and “slate blue” neither macroscopically nor under binocular magnifying glass. Existence among jaspers of the Urals the differences of Radiolarias demands the petrographic comparison of stone raw materials of artifacts of Shikayevka location to siliceous raw materials of the sources assumed by them. First of all, studying of pebble stone raw materials of the Tobol River and its inflows near location is necessary (including in deposits of terraces) as without these researches it is incorrect to draw a conclusion about import of stone raw materials and the direction of migration of manufacturers of artifacts, even in case of compliance of stone raw materials of artifacts of Shikayevka to “jaspers” of the Southern Ural sources.