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The grey wolf (Canis lupus) was the first species to give rise to a domestic population, and they remained widespread throughout the last Ice Age when many other large mammal species went extinct. Little is known, however, about the history and possible extinction of past wolf populations or when and where the wolf progenitors of the present-day dog lineage (Canis familiaris) lived1-8. Here we analysed 72 ancient wolf genomes spanning the last 100,000 years from Europe, Siberia and North America. We found that wolf populations were highly connected throughout the Late Pleistocene, with levels of differentiation an order of magnitude lower than they are today. This population connectivity allowed us to detect natural selection across the time series, including rapid fixation of mutations in the gene IFT88 40,000-30,000 years ago. We show that dogs are overall more closely related to ancient wolves from eastern Eurasia than to those from western Eurasia, suggesting a domestication process in the east. However, we also found that dogs in the Near East and Africa derive up to half of their ancestry from a distinct population related to modern southwest Eurasian wolves, reflecting either an independent domestication process or admixture from local wolves. None of the analysed ancient wolf genomes is a direct match for either of these dog ancestries, meaning that the exact progenitor populations remain to be located.

The article introduces new paleoanthropological materials from the Mayak burial ground near Sidelkino village in the Samara region into scientific discourse. The materials were obtained as a result of excavations in 1995 and only recently was it possible to date them. As a result of AMS analysis fulfilled by the authors, human remains from two burials were dated back to the Early Mesolithic. The analysis was carried out taking into account the influence of the “reservoir effect.Despite the rather poor preservation of individuals from the two described burials, the authors carried out an osteological analysis of an adult male from the second burial. He turned out to be quite tall, with elongated legs, shortened forearms, saber-shaped tibia and relatively massive bones of the lower limbs. In burial 3, the remains of an adult woman and a child of 7–10 years old were found. Comparing the osteological indicators of the man from the second burial with materials from the same burial ground of excavations in 2002, the authors came to the conclusion that the people whose remains were found on the hill Mayak in 1995 and in 2002 probably belong to the same population. Similar morphological characteristics are proof of this.

We present the high-quality genome sequence of a ∼45,000-year-old modern human male from Siberia. This individual derives from a population that lived before-or simultaneously with-the separation of the populations in western and eastern Eurasia and carries a similar amount of Neanderthal ancestry as present-day Eurasians. However, the genomic segments of Neanderthal ancestry are substantially longer than those observed in present-day individuals, indicating that Neanderthal gene flow into the ancestors of this individual occurred 7,000-13,000 years before he lived. We estimate an autosomal mutation rate of 0.4 × 10(-9) to 0.6 × 10(-9) per site per year, a Y chromosomal mutation rate of 0.7 × 10(-9) to 0.9 × 10(-9) per site per year based on the additional substitutions that have occurred in present-day non-Africans compared to this genome, and a mitochondrial mutation rate of 1.8 × 10(-8) to 3.2 × 10(-8) per site per year based on the age of the bone.

The reliability of radiocarbon dates for Palaeolithic human burials is of utmost importance for prehistoric archaeologists. Recently obtained dates for several such burials in central Russia raise important interrelated issues concerning site taphonomy and the precise radiocarbondating technique employed, with implications for the 'true' age of the burials. A critical review of the dating of the Sungir and Kostenki burials calls into question the reliability of employing ultrafiltration or single amino acids for the radiocarbon dating of Upper Palaeolithic bones. Keywords: Russia, Eurasia, Upper Palaeolithic, radiocarbon dating, human bones, Introduction Since the 1990s, significant progress has been made in the dating of Middle and Upper Palaeolithic humans in Eurasia (e.g. Kuzmin & Keates 2014). The importance of the direct [...]

Zhokhov Island in the Siberian High Arctic has yielded evidence for some of the most remote prehistoric human occupation in the world, as well as the oldest-known dog-sled technology. Obsidian [...]

Stephen Leach. A Russian perspective on theoretical archaeology: the life and work of Leo S. Klejn. 2015. 220 pages, 11 b&w illustrations. Walnut Creek (CA): Left Coast; 978-1-629-58-138-5 hardback $79. [...]

Shuidonggou localities 1 and 2 provide key evidence for the Initial Upper Palaeolithic of northeast Asia. In a recent article in Antiquity (87 (2013), 368-383), Li et al. proposed a new chronology, building on the earlier results of Madsen et al. (Antiquity 75 (2001), 705-716). Here Susan Keates and Yaroslav Kuzmin take issue with the new chronology. The article is followed by a response from Li and Gao., Introduction The origin and spread of Initial Upper Palaeolithic (IUP) complexes in East and Central Asia seems, in light of new discoveries, including Palaeolithic human DNA results from China and [...]

Obsidian provenance studies in the southern Kuriles (Kunashir and Iturup islands), part of the insular Russian Far East, are reviewed and summarized for the first time. The sites analyzed belong to the Jomon (ca. 7300–2500 BP), Epi-Jomon (ca. 2500–1400 BP), and Okhotsk (ca. 1400–800 BP) cultural complexes, with particular attention given to the well-studied Yankito 2 site. The main sources of high-quality volcanic glass for the southern Kuriles were on the neighboring Hokkaido Island—Oketo and Shirataki (ca. 140–390 km away). The presence of obsidian at an Epi-Jomon site on southern Kunashir Island originating from remote sources on the Kamchatka Peninsula ca. 1290–1440 km away is an important contribution to understanding the prehistoric contacts and population dispersals that occurred within insular Northeast Asia. This is also supported by paleoanthropological and DNA data from Epi-Jomon human remains on Iturup, showing similarities with native Kamchatkan populations. The use of boats in the southern Kuriles is evident from the beginning of colonization, ca. 7300–7100 BP given that islands were not connected after the Early Holocene due to sea level rise. It is clear that seafaring was an important part of human activities throughout the entire island chain since the Epi-Jomon, ca. 2500 BP. Because the Kurile Islands were one of the most probable migration routes between Northeast Asia (i.e., Japan) and Northeastern Siberia and North America, study of the human colonization of the Kuriles has wider implication for the northeastern part of Eurasia as a gateway to the Americas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

New data were obtained for the Chulym River basin in the southeastern part of the West Siberian Plain, one of the understudied parts of Siberia in terms of age and composition of carbon and nitrogen stable isotopes for Late Pleistocene megafauna. The 14C dates from the Sergeevo outcrop, the most complete section of Late Quaternary deposits in the region, are mostly greater than ~30 550 bp. Other localities yielded 14C values in the range from >44 500 to ~19 300 bp. The finite date of ~42 270 bp for the Khozarian steppe elephant (Mammuthus trogontherii chosaricus) from Asino is intriguing because previously it was not detected in the Late Pleistocene of Siberia after the last interglacial (Marine Isotope Stage 5e), ~115 000–130 000 years ago. Stable isotope data show both similarities and differences compared to the pre‐Last Glacial Maximum megafaunal species in other parts of Siberia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]