Neolithic caches from Prospikhinskaya Shivera-IV site (Lower Angara region)

Purpose. Archaeological caches are a special and relatively scarce type of primary sources for studying cultures of hunters, fishermen and gatherers. They usually include deliberately selected and concealed items, whose purpose can be studied separately, and present multiple layers of information to reveal. It provides a rich paradigm for further research, both in terms of detailed study and in the context of the topics related. Here we consider caches as a type of archaeological objects in the form of a deliberately selected set of artifacts found both within a site cultural layer and outside it. The term «cache» is used as a broad category for objects that are different in their semantic content and form. On the territory of the Lower Angara region, caches dated to the Mesolithic– Bronze Age became known quite recently, mainly in the course of modern research. In total, according to the published materials, there are 14 such objects known, which are represented by different sets of items made of stone, bone and antler. During the excavations of Prospikhinskaya Shivera-IV complex in 2009–2011, two compact sets of items interpreted as caches were found. The purpose of this work is to analyze the caches in the context of their functional and technological specificity. Results. The sets found were located on the periphery of the cultural layer in a zone with not numerous finds scattered without much concentration. According to stratigraphic data and the composition of the caches, their chronology is estimated as the Neolithic Age. The first cache is represented by a so-called «tool kit» which includes various items made of stone and ceramics (total of 35 items). The tools from the cache were analyzed according to the work done on them. The tools without traces of use are represented by a preform of a wedge-shaped core, an unfinished adze, an artifact of an unknown function with two opposite protrusions-spikes (treatment of an elastic cord?) and two small rocks fragments. The main part of the cache set is woodworking tools (25 pieces), which are mainly flakes of non-secondary treatment. The tools of broad functionality were used for scraping, planning, sawing, cutting, drilling, and grinding. There are also some stone tools, a small hammerstone and two groundstones. The individual component of the cache is a fragment of one third of a small vessel of the Aplin type net-impressed pottery typical for the Northern Angara region. The items were presumably placed in some kind of a compact organic receptacle. The second cache consists of unfinished and ready-made adzes with lugs (the tip of an ice pick?), which demonstrate successive production stages of making chopping tools of one type. Caches of chopping tools are serially represented at Holocene sites of the Lower Angara region, in particular, and Northern Eurasia as a whole. It allows us to consider these objects as a specific multicultural type of caches. Conclusion. Caches as an evidence of economic activity should be studied in the broad context of the behavior and subsistence patterns of the Neolithic people of the Lower Angara region. A special study of stone tools found as caches of the Holocene hunters and gatherers of the Lower Angara region is just beginning and requires further development.