Research in the Shulba reservoir zone
The Shulba expedition of the Institute of History, Archeology and Ethnography of the Academy of Sciences of the Kazakh SSR began work in the construction zone of the Shulbi hydroelectric power station. Three detachments led reconnaissance along both banks of the Irtysh from the alignment site (Staraya Shulba - Novobazhenovo) to the Glubokoe village. The valleys of the Shulba, Uba, Osikha, Kyzyl-Su rivers in the East Kazakhstan and Semipalatinsk regions were studied.
More than 20 new Paleolithic sites have been discovered. Along the Karashat River (Osikha) and at the mouth of the Shulba River, flint and jasper-quartzite tools with Mousterian features were found in the Upper Biysk conglomerates. On the second terrace above the floodplain of the Irtysh, the Mousterian locality of Budene I was recorded. Late Paleolithic cores were also found here, and siliceous animal bones were found in the layer of yellow sandy loam. In the area of the village of Azov on the left bank of the Irtysh and 3 km northwest of the village of Kanyndy, Paleolithic artifacts (scrapers, blades and flakes) were collected.
A large series of objects made of jasper quartzite, flint, chalcedony and quartz was obtained during the survey of the tectonic fault valley of the Kyzyl-Su river (Levallois flakes, knives on massive plates, chips, scrapers, punctures). Levallois cores, a serrated tool, a chipper, a series of amorphous and prismatic cores, an elegant knife with retouch along the working edge, semi-marginal chips, and flakes were collected 4 km upstream of the Kyzyl-Su from the village of Arman. Flakes, side-scrapers, bifaces, triangular chips, cores, knives were found near the erosion of conglomerates and Neogene clays near the village of Koitas. Pebble cores were found. Preliminarily, the Kyzyl-Su Paleolithic collection can be attributed to the Mousterian Levallois facies and the Late Paleolithic. Paleontological materials characterize the tubular bones, scapula, vertebrae, and bison's skull. Fragments of a mammoth tusk have been collected near the village of Novobazhenovo.
Neolithic monuments have been discovered. Chalcedonic flakes were collected on blowouts near Staraya Shulba. At the same time, wedge-shaped and amorphous cores, pottery fragments, and calcined bones were found in a coastal cliff near the village of Arman. Neolithic tools were found on the hill of the first floodplain terrace on the left bank of the Kyzyl-Su, 3.5 km below the village of Koitas.
New Bronze Age burial grounds have been discovered: Temir-Kanka, Lambs, Kyzyl-Su, Yuzhnoye. In the river valley Kyzyl-Su, barrows of the Andronovo culture (up to 100 m in diameter and 8 m high) with stone slabs were found. One fence opened. At a depth of 0.8 m from the surface, a grave pit was traced, in which there were two stone cistes covered with stone slabs in two rows. In the northern box (1.15x0.64 m, depth 0.8 m) oriented with a long axis from west to east, a man was buried (in a crouched position on his right side, head to the west). In the southwestern corner of the box lay a jar-shaped earthenware vessel with an ornament in broken lines, applied with a comb stamp. In the southern box (0.98X X52 m, depth 0.65 m), a 13-15-year-old woman was buried with the same orientation (in a strongly crouched position on her left side, with her head to the west). In the northwestern corner of the box stood an earthenware pot with an ornament of five lines drawn along the neck.
Burial grounds of early nomads and Turkic times were recorded along the rivers Karashat, Kyzyl-Su, near Zevakino, Yuzhnoye, Lambs, Proletarki, Pyany Yar villages.