The Stone Age was the most important stage in the history of humanity, which created the foundation of the society development.
According to scientific classification the Stone Age is divided into Paleolithic — Old Stone Age and Neolith — Late Stone Age. Paleolithic epoch included three chronological periods — early (lower), middle (Mousterian) and late (upper).
In the Eastern Kazakhstan, at present the earliest Stone Age are considered to be gadgets of late Mousterian forms found in 1950 to the west of the Kanai E. R. Rygdylon aul (village).
Among the patined and smoothed artefacts, together with bones of buffalo and deer there were scraper-shaped tool with triangular form, a chip with retouching, a piece with plate with retouching on the edge and other handicrafts. According to the morphological indicators they belong to upper Paleolithic.
This situation has analogy to the location of Kyzyl Kuigan in the area of the Koitas village on the Kyzylsu River.
The Stone Age is characterized mainly by the development of workmanship of upper Paleolithic Cave sites, not far from the Bukhtarma River mouth near Novo- Nikolskoye, Svinchatka, Shulbinka villages and others.
At the Cave site on the Bukhtarma river there were found a scraper with circled retouch, scratcher, knife plates, pick hammer, bones of a mammoth rhinoceros, bison, cave hyena, cave lion and of a gigantic Knoblokh camel and others.
The Shulbinka site in Eastern Kazakhstan is the only stratified, wholly studied relic of the late Paleolithic epoch, where more than 5000 handicrafts made of local minerals — pebbles, chalcedony, rock crystal and others were found. Some specialists consider this relic as a site — workshop, functioning for a long time from mustye period up to neolith.
Near the Svinchatka village, pretty impressive series of late Paleolithic articles were collected. Among them there were massive chips and plates of different sizes with retouching, end scrapers, pointed ends, scratchers, puncturer, chisel prismatic nucleuses and others, made of porphyry of different tints and black siliceous rock. In the collection there were notched fluted labor gadgets. According to scientists the materials from Svinchatka village are similar to Paleolithic of Siberia, northern Tajikistan and others. The most probable date of this location is the 2nd half of late Neolithic. It is amazing fact, that some influence of late Paleolithic period is trace in very late stratum of Ust-Narym site. Hence, the stone workmanship in Svinchatka of the very late Paleolithic was that technical substance out of which the Neolithic technics of Ust-Narym emerges.
The period of Neolithic was the time of radical changes in the development of human society, in the transition to producing form of economics. During the transitional epoch — from Paleolithic to Neolithic — there were invented a bow and microliths. New microlithic instruments — miniature stone plates (blades) in the form of triangles, rhombuses, trapeziums and segments were largely developed in neolith.
Relics of the New Stone Age are widely represented on the territory of Kazakhstan.
In Eastern Kazakhstan, the Ust-Narym settlement is a well-explored area, the lower stratum of which belonged to Neolithic time, as well as the Malo-Krasnoyarka settlement, displaying the culture of hunters and fishermen of the Neolithic epoch.
Literature:
Z. Samashev, A. Ermolayeva, G. Kush “The ancient treasures of the Kazakh Altai”, Publisher: “Oner”, 2008.
