A02_06

Dietary reservoir effect correction for mid-Holocene human remains from Sakhtysh, Russia: a novel regression-based approach

Meadows J^1,2, Khramtsova A³, Kostyleva E⁴, Krause-Kyora B⁵, Piezonka H⁶

¹ZBSA (Centre for Baltic and Scandinavian Archaeology), Kiel, Germany, ²Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel, Leibniz-Labor für Altersbestimmung und Isotopenforschung , Kiel, Germany, ³Excellence Cluster ROOTS, Christian-Albrechts-University Kie, Kiel, Germany, ⁴State University Ivanovo, Ivanov, Ivanovo, Russian Federation, ⁵Institute of Clinical Molecular Biology (IKMB), Christian-Albrechts-University Kiel, Kiel, Germany, ⁶Institute for Pre- and Proto-History , Christian-Albrechts-University Kie, Kiel, Germany

Several small prehistoric cemeteries at Sakhtysh, Ivanovo Oblast, Russia, are attributed to the middle Neolithic Lyalovo and late Neolithic-Eneolithic Volosovo cultures (c.5000-4000 cal BC and c.4000-2500 cal BC respectively). Human bone δ¹³C and δ¹⁵N results confirm that these groups were hunter-gatherer-fishers, with sometimes large dietary differences between individuals (Engovatova et al. 2015). Accurate dating has been challenging, due to variable collagen preservation, uncertain association between human skeletal remains and osseous grave goods, and the unknown magnitude of mid-Holocene freshwater reservoir effects, which must have been much greater than those recorded in modern fish.

We present a regression-based approach, which instead of comparing ¹⁴C ages of human bones to those of associated grave goods, relies on ¹⁴C-age differences between different skeletal elements of the same individual. The resulting dietary reservoir effect estimates for 53 samples from 39 individuals are compatible with estimates produced by a diet-reconstruction model based on realistic stable isotope and freshwater reservoir effect baseline values, and with a handful of ¹⁴C dates of osseous grave goods (Macāne et al. 2019). Calibrated dates of individual burials remain imprecise, but we can still observe temporal trends in human diets, which parallel trends elsewhere in northeastern Europe over the same date range.