Sourcing of Obsidian Artefacts as a Proxy for Long-Distance Exchange/Trade in Prehistoric Northeast Asia

Yaroslav V. Kuzmin

The provenancing of obsidian is a powerful tool to investigate prehistoric contacts, migrations, and exchange/trade. Recent progress in this field in Northeast Asia has made it possible to establish with a high degree of certainty the patterns of obsidian acquisition and use in far eastern Russia, Northeastern Siberia, Japan, Korea, and Northeast China. The long-distance exchange and transportation of obsidian is a very important phenomenon; it testifies to the existence of wide communication networks since the Upper Palaeolithic, ca. 30,000–40,000 years ago. The most intensive movement of obsidian is known for the Neolithic (a.k.a. Jomon/Chulmun) cultural complexes, ca. 15,000–3000 years ago. Three source regions are especially noteworthy: 1) Hokkaido Island, with distances from sources to sites (in a straight line) of up to 1000–1200 km to the north, northeast, and south; 2) Kamchatka Peninsula, with distances of up to 1100 km to the north, and 1400 km to the south; and 3) Chukotka, with distances of up to 1500 km. Other networks (Kyushu Island, Paektusan region) were also extensive, with transportation distances reaching up to 700–800 km. The existence of these large-scale networks is extremely important for the prehistoric archaeology of Northeast Asia, because it revealed for the first time unequivocal evidence of wide contacts in the Upper Palaeolithic–Neolithic, and in some regions up to the European/Japanese colonisation.