The Neolithic cremation burial on the coast of the Shida bay (lake Baykal)

In 2023 a group of archaeologists from Irkutsk National Research Technical University conducted excavations of complex No. 3 at Ontkhe 1, which is a cemetery dating to the Neolithic - Early Bronze Age. The stone structure of a rounded shape was made up of stones placed in one layer over the soil. A man-made pit was discovered under the stone layer. In the infill stones of red color, ashes and charcoals were recorded. On the bottom of the pit archaeological material was discovered, namely, a chisel made of slatestone; a pebble hammerstone; a knife (biface) made of quartzite; a flint end-scraper on flake; and a ceramic vessel decorated with dotted line - combed decoration. The artifacts were scattered over the bottom. No human remains and other bone fragments were found during the excavations, which makes typological interpretation of the association difficult. The purpose of the article is to introduce the materials of the excavated complex into scientific circulation, parallel with its cultural, chronological and typological interpretation. Based on a comparative typological analysis of the archaeological material, topographical and structural features of the association, it was established that the excavated construction is a burial performed according to the cremation rite directly in the grave pit and is related to the Serovo burial tradition of the Late Neolithic Olkhon region which corresponds to the early 4th - middle of the 3rd millennia BC.