Steppe Research Papers - Academia.edu (original) (raw)

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- Water resources, Biological Sciences, Percolation, Environmental Sciences
- by Luc Detrain
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- Pleistocene, Quaternary, Peat, Holocene

Russian steppe should be recognized as an endangered biome which dramatically declined and degraded during the last two centuries. We summarize the major economical and conservational values of the Russian part of the steppe
biome relating it with the main elements of the biodiversity pattern of the biome.
The principal factor actually driving the biome dynamics is land use, foremost agriculture. Recently almost all surviving steppes in Russia were used as pastures for cattle, sheep, and horse breeding while speci fi c land-use patterns are characteristic
for each main subdivision of the biome.
The conservation status of the steppe ecosystems is strongly insuf fi cient. The steppe is the least protected biome according to all indicators: the least coverage of protected areas, the least biome fraction in national PAs, the least average area of PA, etc.
For main subdivisions of the steppe biome we estimate the proportion of the area under protection nationally. It comprises 3–10% and for the total biome and all levels of conservation is not exceeding 5%.
Thus the major part of the biome is still unprotected and faces many actual threats and new challenges caused by land use changes, the main ones being conversion (and re-conversion) into cropland, overgrazing and pasture abandonment, wild fires, mining and fossil hydrocarbons extraction, over-exploitation and poaching, and afforestation. Almost all threat intensities and specifics vary following market signals. For example, turning secondary steppes into cropland was significantly intensified due to the global biofuel boom and grain crisis.

- by Ilya Smelansky
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- Ecosystem Services, Conservation, Russia, Land Use Change
- by Elias Pinheiro
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- History, Archaeology, Indo-European Studies, Sintashta

Автореферат диссертации на соискание ученой степени кандидата исторических наук

- by Ivan Grudochko
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- Archaeology, Eurasian Nomads, Early Medieval Archaeology, C14 Dating
- by Marsha Levine
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- Ethology, Archaeology, Ethnography, Archaeozoology
- by Péter Juhász
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- History, Cultural History, Economic History, Languages and Linguistics

A pars-pro-toto mode of expression, evident in various zoomorphic junctures, dominates the visual record of the early Eurasian nomads. What was previously labeled as "animal style" is in fact a rather complex visual language rooted in a number of sophisticated tropes, with "visual synecdoche", inversion, and abbreviation emerging as the primary tropes. In this study, I delve into the vast nomadic art collection of the Penn Museum and observe how the aforementioned visual devices could be helpful in strengthening curatorial practices and art-historical analysis of early steppe art.

- by PETYA ANDREEVA
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- Museum Studies, Animal Studies, Central Asian Studies, Eurasian Nomads
- by Antonio J. Velázquez de Castro
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- Spain, Fauna, Curculionoidea, Steppe

The authors analyze the available materials and suggest that the psalia of the Maklasheevo culture can be legitimately synchronized with the psalia used in the southern part of Eastern Europe during the subsequent Belozersk period. The early Belozersk psalias of the south of Eastern Europe are prototypes for the late Belozersk psalia of this territory, and for the psaltery of the Maklasheevo culture. At the same time, no psalia which are similar to the Early Belozersk ones in question have been discovered in the Volga-Kama region. Obviously, the Late Belozersk type of psalia appeared in the area of the Maklasheevo culture in an already established form. The authors also suggest a certain influence on the horse bridle of the Volga-Kama region from the east - the Trans-Urals and Siberia. However, the strongest influence on the appearance of the Maklasheevo bridle was made by the cultures (or a single culture) of the southern part of Eastern Europe. This was most likely facilitated by the fact that certain groups of the Maklasheevo culture settled in the steppe. Due to the scarcity of available information the scale of penetration of the Maklasheevo culture representatives into the steppe remains uncertain: it either had a character of a migration or short-term visits.

Domestication of horses fundamentally transformed long-range mobility and warfare1. However, modern domesticated breeds do not descend from the earliest domestic horse lineage associated with archaeological evidence of bridling, milking and corralling2–4 at Botai, Central Asia around 3500 bc3. Other longstanding candidate regions for horse domestication, such as Iberia5 and Anatolia6, have also recently been challenged. Thus, the genetic, geographic and temporal origins of modern domestic horses have remained unknown. Here we pinpoint the Western Eurasian steppes, especially the lower Volga-Don region, as the homeland of modern domestic horses. Furthermore, we map the population changes accompanying domestication from 273 ancient horse genomes. This reveals that modern domestic horses ultimately replaced almost all other local populations as they expanded rapidly across Eurasia from about 2000 bc, synchronously with equestrian material culture, including Sintashta spoke-wheeled char...

- by Alan Outram
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- Geography, Archaeology, Prehistoric Archaeology, Indo-European Studies
- by Nadezhda Kotova
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- Geography, Archaeology, Prehistoric Archaeology, Indo-European Studies
- by Ivan S Daraktchiev
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- Christianity, European History, Eastern European Studies, European Studies
- by Bayarsaikhan Uudus
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- Far East, Land Cover, Change detection, Maximum Likelihood

- by Kristian Kristiansen
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- Geography, Archaeology, Prehistoric Archaeology, Indo-European Studies
- by Libor Petr
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- Earth Sciences, Plant Ecology, Palynology, Palaeoecology
- by Gus Gintzburger
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- Botany, Landscape Ecology, Climate Change, Conservation Biology
- by B. Krause-kyora
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- Genetics, Archaeology, Prehistoric Archaeology, Mobility/Mobilities

The Cucuteni-Trypillia complex (CTC) flourished in eastern Europe for over two millennia (5100–2800 BCE) from the end of the Neolithic to the Early Bronze Age. Its vast distribution area encompassed modern-day eastern Romania, Moldova and western/central Ukraine. Due to a lack of existing burials throughout most of this time, only little is known about the people associated with this complex and their genetic composition. Here, we present genome-wide data generated from the skeletal remains of four females that were excavated from two Late CTC sites in Moldova (3500–3100 BCE). All individuals carried a large Neolithic-derived ancestry component and were genetically more closely related to Linear Pottery than to Anatolian farmers. Three of the specimens also showed considerable amounts of steppe-related ancestry, suggesting influx into the CTC gene-pool from people affiliated with, for instance, the Ukraine Mesolithic. The latter scenario is supported by archaeological evidence. Take...

- by Angela Simalcsik
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- Genetics, Geography, Archaeology, Prehistoric Archaeology

Исходя из действующего на сегодняшний день определения большого (или «царского») кургана скифского времени как архитектурной конструкции, состоящей не только из погребений, кладов, схронов, ритуальных комплексов и возведенного над ними сооружения кургана, но также и территории вокруг самого кургана - его околокурганного пространства, называемого также периферией - авторы статьи при проведении полевых археолого-геофизических исследований могильников раннего железного века в степных регионах северного центрального Предкавказья и северо-западного Кавказа уделяли особое внимание изучению именно периферии большого кургана, как одного из носителей информации о сложных и многосоставных культово-религиозных церемониях и обрядах древних кочевников раннего железного века I тыс. до н.э. Результаты работ на территории Ставропольского края и на Кубани показали значительное различие в принципах использования периферии курганов в ходе церемоний погребально-поминального цикла носителями скифской культуры по разным берегам среднего течения р. Кубани.

- by Anton Gass and +1
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- Geophysics, North Caucasus, Kurgans, Scythian archaeology

Dynamics of cellulose decomposition activity of chernozems in steppe zone Zauralskogo Plateau are investigated (on example of reserve "Arkaim" in Chelyabinsk region). As objects of studies were the soils with natural vegetation as well as unploughed soils. The observations carried out during last 10 years after introduction reserved mode. The purpose of the observations was to study natural reconstruction of soil microbial proper-ties after stopping the agricultural treatment. According to the forecast it-negralny indicator of soil biological activity - cellulase activity - reservoir analysis will approach the virgin by 2045, 57 years after the cessation of agricultural use in the form of plowing.

- by Liudmila N. Plekhanova and +1
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- Environmental Engineering, Landscape Ecology, Environmental Science, Environmental microbiology

- by Roxana Dobrescu
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- Geography, Archaeology, Prehistoric Archaeology, Indo-European Studies

The survey carried out in the ‘arid margins of northern Syria’, a region with great climatic and edaphic constraints, covered nearly 7000 km2. The large number of sites discovered, the repetitiveness of the types of situations and the analysis of the environments enables us to address the problems concerning the occupation of the land and human exploitation, in time and space. The Bronze Age, which had phases of high prosperity and of marked decline, provides a very good example. During this period, the fluctuations in population were particularly marked and reveal
very different strategies of exploitation. A stable political situation could have contributed to a development of the occupation of the region at the end of the Early Bronze Age: sedentary settlements were numerous and occupied a territory which was probably defined to the east by a wall 200 km long. At the beginning of the second millennium (Middle Bronze Age) however, conditions changed: permanent habitation shrunk towards the west, protected by complex defensive systems (fortresses, forts and guard towers). As for the Late Bronze Age, as elsewhere in central
Syria, there was a phase of recession which remains to be explained.

- by Bernard Geyer and +1
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- Settlement Patterns, Arid environments, Syria, Bronze Age (Archaeology)

Le Groupe EIER-ETSHER a entrepris d'evaluer les risques d'eutrophisation et de comblement des plans d'eau en menant une etude sur une dizaine de retenues d'eau choisies dans les trois principales zones climatiques du Burkina Faso a savoir: la zone soudanienne de savane, caracterisee par une vegetation boisee; la zone soudano sahelienne de savane a graminees; et la zone sahelienne de steppe arbustive. Sur la base de mesures d'indicateurs de niveau d'eutrophie et de mesures bathymetriques, les resultats de l'etude revelent que: (a) le comblement par transport de solides represente la menace preponderante pour les plans d'eau en zone sahelienne; ce risque est plutot faible en zones soudanienne et soudano sahelienne; et (b) le risque d'eutrophisation de grande envergure s'avere faible pour les plans d'eau en zone soudanienne et soudano sahelienne. Ce risque semble inexistant en zone sahelienne a cause des suspensions solides dans l'eau qui...

- by Kokou Denyigba
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- Evaluation, Risk assessment, Eutrophication, Transport

The following paper briefly examines an array of contemporary Polish cultural artefacts which explore Poland’s connection with the Great Steppe, ranging from the Polish-Tatar poetry of Musa Caxarxan through theatrical spectacles of the director Cezary Studniak to the latest album of the world music group Warsaw Village Band. Drawing on these artistic practices the paper proposes a novel deterritorialisation of contemporary Polish culture from the point of view of irruptions of the Great Steppe, seen in terms of the Deleuzian nomadic war machine. Such a move is already prefigured in works of Polish writers and scholars as diverse as Witold Michałowski, Andrzej Stasiuk, Maria Janion, Ewa Thompsom, Tomasz Mizerkiewicz and Przemysław Czapliński. In masterly and nuanced argument Czapliński revisits Sarmatism – the hybrid Orientalised cultural formation of Polish nobility between the 16th and 19th centuries – to suggest ways in which it can become a springboard for common empowerment in post-transformation Poland. Czapliński posits Sarmatism, rewritable as an explosion and creative incursion of the steppe, at the centre of the tectonic clashes between Polish modernity and tradition. I understand Czapliński’s project as an expression of Antonio Negri’s altermodernity seeking to extend beyond the dialectical opposition between modernity and anti-modernity through rupture and transformation. Czapliński’s creative recasting of Negri’s particular take on communism, understood as producing common social practices by harnessing the potential of bodies in the age of bio-politics, opens up a unique and refreshing vista in Eastern European Studies. Maria Janion in turn suggests a parallel rewriting of Polish culture which derives it jouissance from transgression of borders, shifting zones of indeterminacy, acculturation and hybridity. However, Janion disappoints when she draws almost exclusively on Polish High Romanticism with its frenetic celebration of ancient Slavic lore, in the end subscribing to the transcendental meta-language of haunting and ghostly, disembodied presences. Despite its drawbacks, Janion’s school of phantasmatic criticism has proven influential in Polish cultural studies in the last twenty years. However, it can be argued that by turning to the steppe one can move beyond the psychoanalytical frame of Janion’s followers towards a new paradigm of criticism: localized, embodied and immanent, performance rather then code – like an arrow across the steppe.

- by Renaud Jaunatre
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- Paleoecology, Ecosystems, Fauna, Species Diversity
- by frederic abbes
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- Syria, Neolithic, PPNA PPNB sites, Steppe

Les marges arides de la Syrie du Nord proposent une vaste gamme de milieux naturels, une mosaique qui correspond a une grande variete des potentiels agronomiques differents. Les reponses de l’Homme a cette variete ont ete multiples. Confronte a l’aridite et a l’aleatoire, il a appris l’adaptabilite : dans la plupart des cas, les choix d’occupation du sol suivent les propositions du milieu. Les confi gurations qui en resultent sont contrastees, depuis des milieux privilegies (faydas et grands oueds) jusqu’aux milieux abiotiques (sebkhas) : mais, toujours, l’occupation du sol revele des choix raisonnes. L’adaptation se fonde sur une evidente connaissance des realites du milieu, mais aussi sur l’introduction, a differentes epoques, de techniques hydrauliques ou hydroagricoles. L’exemple le plus caracteristique est celui de l’epoque byzantine, durant laquelle se met en place une organisation zonale de la production et qui connait parallelement un developpement sans equivalent pour la re...

- by Marie-Odile Rousset
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- Geography, Geoarchaeology, Hydraulics, Production

Interdisciplinary studies of the sediments of Lago dell’Accesa started in 2001. We present here results from the palynological study. The pollen diagram provides a record of vegetation and climatic change spanning over 15,000 years. The oldest pollen spectra show a late-glacial steppe vegetation typical of central and southern Italy during this period. The Late-glacial Interstadial, interrupted by two cooling events, is dominated by open deciduous oak forests. The Younger Dryas is represented by 150 cm of sediment and shows the presence of steppic vegetation. The Holocene vegetation is characterised by alternating dominance of deciduous oaks and Quercus ilex. The three zones characterised by Q. ilex are accompanied by peat layers marking lake-level lowering at ca. 8600–7900, 4600–4300 and 3700–2800 cal b.p. Between approximately 9000 and 6000 cal b.p. extensive Abies-forests existed on the Colline Metallifere located 15–20 km to the north and northeast of the lake. Local fir populations may also have existed by the lake. Human impact starts at approximately 8000 cal b.p. during the Neolithic period, and increases at ca. 4300 cal b.p. Castanea and Juglans pollen is recorded from ca. 2800 cal b.p. The impact of the Etruscan settlement near the lakeshore is shown in the increasing values of arable crops, species of secondary forest canopy (Ericaceae, Pinus, Pistacia, Myrtus) and anthropogenic indicators (Chenopodiaceae, Plantago lanceolata, Rumex etc).

- by Anton Drescher
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- History, Archaeology, Geology, Climate Change
- by Martina Carrete
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- Western Europe, Land Use Change, Biological Sciences, Environmental Sciences
- by Andrey Epimakhov
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- Archaeology, Bronze Age Archaeology, Bronze Age, World Prehistory

- by Krisztina Somogyi
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- Geography, Archaeology, Prehistoric Archaeology, Indo-European Studies

How well the ecology, zoogeography and evolution of modern biotas is understood depends substantially on knowledge of the Pleistocene1, 2. Australia has one of the most distinctive, but least understood, Pleistocene faunas. Records from the western half of the continent are especially rare3. Here we report on a diverse and exceptionally well preserved middle Pleistocene vertebrate assemblage from caves beneath the arid, treeless Nullarbor plain of south-central Australia. Many taxa are represented by whole skeletons, which together serve as a template for identifying fragmentary, hitherto indeterminate, remains collected previously from Pleistocene sites across southern Australia. A remarkable eight of the 23 Nullarbor kangaroos are new, including two tree-kangaroos. The diverse herbivore assemblage implies substantially greater floristic diversity than that of the modern shrub steppe, but all other faunal and stable-isotope data indicate that the climate was very similar to today. Because the 21 Nullarbor species that did not survive the Pleistocene were well adapted to dry conditions, climate change (specifically, increased aridity) is unlikely to have been significant in their extinction.

- by John Long
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- Ancient History, Pharmacology, Biochemistry, Bioinformatics
- by Karsten Wesche
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- Climate variability, Theory, Productivity, Ecology
- by Andrey Dara and +1
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- Remote Sensing, Climate Change, Climatology, Web GIS
- by Marie-Odile Rousset and +1
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- Landscape Archaeology, Byzantine Archaeology, Ancient Agriculture & Farming (Archaeology), Syria (Archaeology)

- by Sirbu Ghenadie
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- Geography, Archaeology, Prehistoric Archaeology, Indo-European Studies

- by Umberto Tecchiati
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- Geography, Archaeology, Prehistoric Archaeology, Indo-European Studies

Dès les premières campagnes de prospection réalisées dans les Marges arides de la Syrie du Nord, notre attention a été attirée par le très grand nombre de murs, de murets, d’enclos dont les traces étaient encore perceptibles dans les paysages dépouillés qui caractérisent la badiya syrienne. Il est vrai qu’il y a là peu de végétation qui puisse masquer les vestiges, peu de reliefs qui puissent les soustraire durablement au regard. Mais cette abondance même nous a posé bien des problèmes d’identification de ces vestiges, de compréhension de leurs fonctions et de leurs usages. Ce que le paysage offrait à nos yeux était un palimpseste, la résultante de milliers d’années d’exploitation, d’aménagements, d’abandons et de reprises aussi, où se mêlent et s’enchevêtrent les traces des tentatives de l’homme de s’adapter autant que faire se peut aux conditions d’aridité très contraignantes qui caractérisent la région. Les discussions furent nombreuses entre les membres de l’équipe pour tenter de déméler cet écheveau, encore compliqué par les multiples phénomènes de dépôts (alluviaux, éoliens...) et d'érosion qui viennent peu ou prou masquer ou oblitérer les traces.

- by Bernard Geyer and +1
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- Geography, Geoarchaeology, Syria, Holocene

The malacological material of the mound bodies (kurgans) of the Great Hungarian Plain indicates a mixed vegetation of dry and humid environments, developed on a mosaic of alkaline and chernozem soils in the period of the construction of the kurgan. The malacofauna that evolved in the upper soil horizon of the mound indicates the extremely dry environmental conditions of steppes, charaterized by the dominance of thermoxerophilous species. Dominant species of this kurgan are Chondrula tridens, Helicopsis striata, Granaria frumentum and Cepaea vindobonensis. The species composition shows that there are differences in the malacofauna of the Danube-Tisa Interfluves region compared to that of the lowlands east of River Tisza, indicated by the higher dominance of Granaria frumentum and Helicopsis striata in the former region. Following the construction of the kurgans an island-like, dry habitat developed on their surface, covered by black soil and populated by a steppe fauna, the compositi...

- by Dávid Molnár and +1
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- Holocene, Steppe
- by Bernard Geyer and +1
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- Arid environments, Syria, Land Use, Semi-arid Environments
- by Yakov Gershkovich
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- Central Eurasia, Kazakhstan, Asia, Domestication

В 2015-2016 гг. археолого-геофизическому исследованию подверглась периферия больших курганов скифского времени на территории Кубани. Нами проводились доисследования таких выдающихся памятников скифской истории как Костромские/Разменные курганы (Краснодарский край) и могильник Келермес (республика Адыгея), не раз уже отраженных в литературе и хорошо известных широкому кругу специалистов.
Результаты работ показали значительные различия в принципах использования периферии больших курганов древними кочевниками 1-ого тыс. до н.э. по разным берегам среднего течения р. Кубани. Этот факт может свидетельствовать как о разнице погребально-поминальной обрядности древних кочевников, так и о возможном различном этническом составе кочевого населения раннего железного века на современных территориях Краснодарского и Ставропольского краев.

- by Anton Gass and +1
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- Geophysics, North Caucasus, Archaeological Geophysics, Scythian archaeology
- by Krzysztof Sobczyk
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- Archaeology, Geochemistry, Archaeological Science, Radiocarbon
- by Karsten Wesche
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- Multidisciplinary, Mountain development, Soil Fertility, Vegetation

Le programme « Marges arides de la Syrie du Nord » vise à comprendre les relations hommes - milieu dans une région, située au sud-est d’Alep, où la sécheresse représente une contrainte forte. Diverses approches ont été développées : analyse du milieu, prospection archéologique, étude ethnoarchéologique, relevé des sites, reconstitution des paléoenvironnements, confrontation de situations actuelles et passées. La prospection (1995-2002) a concerné près de 7000 km2 sur les quelques 10000 km2 prévus à l’origine. Le nombre élevé de sites (près de 1000), la répétitivité des types de situations, l’analyse des milieux, permettent d’aborder les problèmes d’occupation du sol et de mise en valeur, tant dans l’espace que dans le temps.

- by Mohamed Al Dbiyat and +4
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- Archaeology, Near Eastern Archaeology, Geoarchaeology, Arid environments
- by Daniel Syrbe
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- History, Eurasian Nomads, Byzantine Studies, Late Antiquity