Khuzhir-Nuge XIV is a Bronze Age cemetery site in the Cis-Baikal region of Siberia, Russia, and an example of the Serovo-Glazkovo culture. It is the largest Bronze Age hunter-gatherer cemetery ever excavated in the region.
Excavations at the cemetery site have identified a total of 89 human burials placed in shallow sub-rectangular pits filled with rocks and loamy sand. All of the interments are hunter-gatherers, and were buried dated between about 6800 and 2250 BC. About 70% of the burials are dated to the Glazkovo culture between 4450 and 4250 years bp. Other cultures represented at Khuzhir-Nuge XIV are Early Neolithic Kitoi, Late Neolithic and Bronze Age Serovo cultures.
Strontium analysis of the skeletons has revealed evidence that the hunter-gatherers here included fish as a substantive part of the diet and traveled outside the immediate valley to obtain food. More than half of the Glazkovo population was born outside of the immediate area, evidence of mobility.
Sources
Haverkort, Caroline M., et al. 2008 Hunter-gatherer mobility strategies and resource use based on strontium isotope (87Sr/86Sr) analysis: a case study from Middle Holocene Lake Baikal, Siberia. Journal of Archaeological Science 35:1265-1280.
Weber, Andrzej, David W. Link, and M. A. Katzenberg 2002 Hunter-Gatherer Culture Change and Continuity in the Middle Holocene of the Cis-Baikal, Siberia. Journal of Anthropological Archaeology 21(2):230-299.
Weber, Andrzej, Hugh G. McKenzie, Roelf Beukens, and Olga I. Goriunova 2005 Evaluation of radiocarbon dates from the Middle Holocene hunter-gatherer cemetery Khuzhir-Nuge XIV, Lake Baikal, Siberia. Journal of Archaeological Science 32(10):1481-1500.
This glossary entry is part of the Dictionary of Archaeology.
