"Ethno-archaeology among Evenkian forest hunters. Preliminary results and a different approach to reality"

Mesolithic on the Move Papers presented at the Sixth International Conference on the Mesolithic in Europe,

Stockholm 2000

Edited by Lars Larsson Hans Kindgren, Kjel Knutsson, David Loejjler and Agneta Akerlund

Oxbow Books 2003

Spatial Organisation of Sites

30. Ethno-archaeology among Evenkian forest hunters. Preliminary results and a different approach to reality!

Ole Gren and Oleg Kuznetsov

The paper is based on ethno-archaeological data col­lected by the authors among [he Evenki reindeer humers in northern Transbaikal, Siberia. II focuses 011 tire back­grollnd/or and fhe spalial e.lfecl of riflfalmonipulmiol1 o/Ihe material during site formation Ihat may hm'e a greatly undere:a;'lIafed ill/pac! on ",here objects are loeared 011 siles.

Introduction

A genera l problem for archaeology is that 'irra tional" cultural e lements such as cult and ritual undoubtedly ha\"c played an important ro le in most of the prehistoric societi es whereas our ability to dea l w ith spiri tual phenomena that control the material culture is restr icted in our in terpretat ions. The central point we wish to stress in thi s paper is that ri tua l behaviour must a lso be considered an important agent in site format ion. This seems to have been overseen in a many archaeological and ethno-a rchaeological settlement studies.

Extensive social anthropological data show that human cultures follow certain rules \vhen they organise them­selves in space. These rules are often related to re lig ious and cosmo logical ideas . In some cases it is possibl e in preh istor ic settl ements to distinguish repeated spatial patterns in specifi c object categories that seem to reflect such spatia lly patterned behaviour (Rank 1951: Tanner 1979; Gren 1989, 1991 , 1995, 1998: Yates 1989). To better understand the nature of such rules. their relat ion to religion and cosmology, and how they work in practi ce. ethnoarchaeological snldies were started in 1997 among the Evenkian reindeer hunters in Northern Transbaikal , Siberia. The fi e ld \vork is can-ied OUI as a collaboration between NTNA'N IKU, Norway, the Centre for Cultural Anthropology and Ecology of the Transbaikal Natives, the Chita State Technical University, The Chita Regional Museum of Human and Natural History, and The Evenks community in Chapo Ologo.

Our results demonstrate that ritual manipulation oflhe material in sett lements may have a greatly underestimated impact on where many types of objects are deposi ted and

indicate that such conscious differentiation in the handling of diffe rent categories of waste_ for instance. may have been an important factor in the formation of archaeo­logical s ites. In spite of th is ' blurri ng ' of the acti vity patterns. it is interesting that some object types st ill seem directly to reflect the repeated spa tial pattems controlling behaviour in the dwellings .

It should be noted that our study area is only a fraction of the enormous area where the Evenk ian Culture is found. \Vhereas most Evenks today subsist as farmers or herders, nomadic hunter-gatherers are st ill found in some areas. Because of the yar iance in the Evenkian Culture. observ­ations fro m one restricted area cannot all be regarded as general for this culture and should accordingly not be used direct ly as a model for all hunter-gatherers. Meanwhile, we are cOI1\'inced that they in combination with other social anthropological and ethno-archaeologica l data can be used to point out some themes of general \·alue.

Some of the behavioural elements we have observed are barely mentioned in the literatLll'e on the Evenkian Culture and have never been described in detail. It is surprising that there sti ll is such basic infonnation to gather. Unfortunately_ ifpresent development continues, it would also be surprising if the sa me phenomena can be observed in 10-20 years.

The urgency of the collec tion of ethnoarchaeological data from hunting clilnlres living in forested environments closely resembling those of Mesolithic Europe appears from the fact that the maj ority of the examples we use as a basis for interpretation of European Mesol ithic Cultures derive from extreme environments such as polar areas or deserts. Our results from the Evellks indicate that fores t cu ltures wi th access to firewood in large amounts Inay behave differently.

The Evenks - alld the Northern Trallsbaikal

Apart from Orochcn and Tlfnglls a large number of other names have been applied to groups with a closer or more distant re lation to the Evenkian Cu lhlre (Shirokogoroff 1979). In spite of the fact that many sources give the

Etlll1o-arclweologl' among E "enkian forest hlfJ1lerS 2 17

impression that no Evenks follow a traditional way orlife any more (e.g. Vasileyich and Smolyak 1964). \\'e found that some - in spite of the influenc e from modern civilisat ion - still li ve as nomadic reindeer hunters and have large parts of their old beli efs and behav io ur preserved. Bark tents were lIsed by some till the carly 'SOs, and th e traditional religion seems little influenced by the restricted activities of missionaries in the area. Hunting families often use 15- 30 domestica ted reindeer for transportation - riding them or using them to pull the sledges - but they are hunters not herders . The domesti­ca ted reindeer of the E venks can be compared to the dogs of the Greenland Inuit. The hunting groups subsist on the meat o f wild re indeer. elk. red deer. musk deer and mountain sheep. as ,,"ell as birds and fish from the lakes and ri vers (Shirokogoroff 1979: Anderson 1991).

The Transbaikal region is part of the mountain zone that separa tes the Central Asiatic Steppe in the sOllth from the Siberian Plateau in the north. The steepest and highest mountains with heights up to 3.073 metres are found in the Northern Transbaikal. Above the open grass areas in the broader valleys is an open forest of pine . larch. fir. a li ttle Siberian cedar and some birch in the moister p laces and with reindeer mosses strongly represented in its fl oor. Th is 'taiga' continues up to the tree line at an a ltitude of about 2.000 metres . The average temperatures vary fr0111 -36 °C in winters to 18°C in summer with extremes around ·55 °C and 35 °C. Th is. combined \,·ith the restricted snow cover due to the 10\\· a\"erage precipi tat ion in the area. mai ntains permafrost conditions e\"en though the centre of the Northern Transbai kal is as far south as 57°30' N. 150 k111 nO[1h and 550 km east of the northernmost poi nt of Ihe Lake Baika l (Baulin el al. 1984 : Wright and Barnovsky 1984: Ivanenkov and Fraiehe"a 1997).

We never move - it 's the world that moves - the organisation of space The world concept of the E,·enks is surprising to us and gives insight in to their ideas about the space within which thei r se ttlements exist. \Vhen tra\"clling from A to B their idea is that they 'don-t move it's the ,vorld that moves'. According to this concept they always stay in the same place and therefore their different settlements are in the same place - they are 'the same p lace'. Therefore thei r dwell ings and senlements are organised 'in the same way-.

Such an idea is not unique. Tanner has recorded a similar idea from the Mistassini Cree in the James Bay Area and compa rab le -egocen tric' ideas have been obse rved in other nomadic hunter-gatherer cultures (Holmberg 1922: Schmidt 1935. 194 1: Tan ner 1979:73: Eliade 1983:212 pl. From a psychological poinl of view. it see ms quite plausible that nomadic people create stab ility in their ever changing world by locating them­selves in a place that is always the same.

Wi th the Evenks of Northern Transbaika l the most ::, ac red part orthe dwelling is the 'maIn' at the back of the

dwelling. Here was a sacred passage for bringing sable (Siberian mal1en) into the tent when it was killed. It could not be brought in through the normal entrance_ Behind the dwelling was also the tree with the ' Barrilak-dolls ' . Barrilak is a god in the shape of a liale old man clad in a hunter 's clothes. He is the god of the land and lives in the hearth. The 'Ban·ilak--doll s hung in the tree in small leather bags. They brought the hunters luck in their hunt. The dolls were cut out of wood and dressed in clothes of reindeer skin. In the Northern Transba ikal the dolls were not taken into the tent as described by Shirokogoroff (Shirokogoroff 1979:255).

In a one-family dwelling. one side of the entrance area is regarded as the women' s side and the other as the men's side. Kitchen utensils. containers and food are stored against the wall just inside the entrance on (he women' s side in the area called -tjungal" (with a box for plates, etc.). Male equipment such as hunt ing gear, male clo thes, etc .. is stored against the wall fUl1her bac k in the tent on the men's side. The guns are placed horizontally resting on two Y -shaped sticks adjacent to the tent wall just beside the men-s sleeping places. so that there is qu ick access to them .

The firewood is piled up between the entrance and the hearth/oven and to some degree around the latter for dry ing. This also functions as a visual marking of the border between the ' male side ' and the 'female side'. If the door - seen from the outside - opens on the left s ide (this means it must be moved outwards and to the right to open), the women's side is to the left inside tbe entrance and the men 's to the right. If the door opens on the right, this scheme is reversed. The first pattern is defin itely the Illost used one. \Ve have not yet been able to find out what controls which way the door opens. The Evenks reject that it is the right or left -handedness of the man, as it is with the Sami in the Swedish Lule district (Rank 1951 :88).

For the night the wife moves to the men's side, and the couple normally sleeps parallel to the wall with thei r feet to the door in the area cal led 'be ' . The w ife lies along the wall and the man beside the oven. It was explained to us that he has to hold the wanncs t position, but a lso that it is his duty to tend the fire during the night. If the tent is fu ll , some or all of the occupanls may lie radia lly with their feet to the fire. In thi s case the Illan w ill li e nearest to the entrance. The p lace of the chi ldren is at the back of the tent .. because that is the wannest place' , as one infonnant stated. Nonnally they are arranged so that the smallest child has its place closest to the ' man's side ' where the couple sleep. During the night. the children s leep along the wall or with their feet to the fire.

Single elder members of the fami ly (parents of the married couple. uncles, aunts. etc,) wi ll during the day, seen from the entrance, have their place in the tent beside and behind the woman if they are female and bes ide and behind the man if they a re male. Their sleeping place is along the wall opposite the place where the host couple

218 Ole Gron lind Oleg Klenelsol"

sJeeps - also called 'be' . Thus they sleep in the women's

side of the dwelling. Guests will during the day follow the same patlern as described here. At night they will s leep in the 1110St sacred part ofIhe tent. the malu. between the children.

The organi sational pattern described here resembles closely that described in the creat ion myth describing the Evenk's descent from the bear recorded from the Sym and Bayak it Evcnks by Vasilevich (Vasilevich 1963):

"A girl. Kheladan. was walking on and on until at last she came to the bear. The bear said: 'Ki ll me and etll me up. Place my heart to s leep beside you. put my kidneys in the place of honour (the malu) behind the hearth, my duodenum and rectum place opposi te you. spread out my fu r in a dry ditch . hang my small intestincs on a dry, bent-over tree. and put my head to sleep near malu (the place of honour) .. Kheladan killed lhe bear and did all as he had ordered. In the moming she awoke and looked . At the place of honour there were two ch ildren (the kidneys) playing. an old man (the head) was sleep ing near them. whi le opposite him were sleeping an old man and an old woman (the in testines). She glanced outside - there \\·ere some re indeer (the fur) walking about and the little va lley was full of reindeer. She ran out of the yurt. and there were some halte rs (the small intest ines) hanging on the slanting tree. ,-

This shows hO\\' rhe organisation of space ins ide the dwelling can be controlled and ' legitimated' by myth­ology. Our stud ies also show that the sett lements are organised in accordance with a set of spatial rules. The spatial re lation between the dwellings. the act ivity areas. the waste platforms. and the banks the settlements are located on. etc. , also seems to be regulated by a set of spatial rules.

The archaeological point is that the dwell ings and settlements are organised spatially in accordance with a set of rulcs that are formally 'cxplained ' by cosmology and mythology. From an anthropological point of view. it may also be relevant to be awarc of the social -psych­o logical effects of such spatial patterns (Gran 1991).

Reuse of dwellings - ({n old dwelling

Especially in the summer base camps, dwellings are often re-used year aftcr year. Earlier, the Larch bark dllytchars (pointed tents of the 'tipi '-type) used on sllch sites were left as they were and then repaired next time the site was inhabited. With the modern canvas tents. a frame of stakes is left in posit ion so that the cover can easily be put over it again.

In 1998 wc excavated an old summer dyutchar that. according to the oral infonnation we cou ld obtain as well as the da table finds, was constructed around 1930 and destroyed around 1970. From the stakes that were still preserved below ground level it could be seen that it had

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been round with a diameter of approxi mate ly 6 metres. Three different families had used it in this period. Dimitri Danilo\· and his wife had used it for approx imately 15 years. in the late '-lOs and ' 50s. Another family had used it before them and a third after thcm.

The distribution of caps. bu llets and whole cartridges shows a clear concentrat ion centrally in the dwe lling, whereas none of these were found in its sourhwcstem half (Figure 30.1 ). The diffe rent types that \\·ere found show tha t they \\"ere not deposited during one season. Probably, the spatia lly di scretc concentrat ion has accumulated through the 40 years the tent was in use.

The distribution of net fl oats differs clearly fro m that of cartridge parts. It is concentra ted in the southwestern part of the excavated area (Figure 30.1 ). The net tloats are mainly of the trad itiona l type made as rolls of birch bark . whi lc a few are can·ed out of\\·ood and u couple cut out of Styrofoam. Also here it is most likely that the floats c:\cuyated have been deposited through several seasons.

The fact that some types through time seem to have been deposited in the same zones. even though rhey were maybe not e\'cn deposited by the same group of in­habitants, can most reasonably be explained by assumi ng that the objects found were handled by persons seared in accordance with a general set of spatial mles as discussed above.

At the Magiemose sire Ulkestrup II. where the bark floor was \\·ell preserved. it has been suggested tha t the presence of t\\'O part ly overlapping hearths inside the dwelling. repair of one of the walls (two rows o f wall stakes) . and the appearance of left-retouched triangles only in the bottom of the cultu re layer and rigl1l-retollched ones only in its top most likely reflects that the dwelling was inhabited - at least t\\·ice. The distributions of the left- and the right -retouched triangles conjoin ins ide the dwelling and form one small concentrat ion (A ndersen 1982; Gron 1995:27 pp).

The Evenks- paraliel to the Magiemose Culture - use floors of twigs and som etimes thin trunks in their dwellings. New twigs are added when the old ones are

Erhno-archaeo!ogr among E l'enkian foresr hUl1ters 219

worn nat (approximately every third day). When a settlement is abandoned. the old floor twigs are removed. \Iv'hen the dwelling is re-occupied a new floor is laid. If small objects such as microliths or parts of cartridges fall through this type of flooring. the danger that they be removed from their position is minimised. Outside the dwelling. the E\"enks keep the settlement surface orderly· and clean. Here the chances of removal of even small items is considerably larger.

If a dwelling is cleared out between the occupations. the material found in it may well reflect its spatial organisation. but only from the last phase of occupation, as fvlobjerg concludes on the basis of the data from her ethnoarchaeological investigation of an Inuit \\-inter house in Greenland (Mobjerg 1991 ).

The re-use of the same settlements year after year seems to be facilitated in locations where sufficient amounts of fuel are accessible (fire\\·ood or fat from sea mammals). Hunting cultures in areas with less fuel often avoid old settlement sites for longer periods (e.g. Rogers 1967 :9 p: Silberbauer 1981 :222 . 245 p l . [n general. our possibilities for finding preserved patterns in the archaeo­logical material that reflect the social organisation of a society may depend on the amounts of fuel available.

The size of the settlements

One must be a\\"are that a settlement is more than a central area with one or more d\\"ellings. Around the d\\·e llings will be different types of platfonns. storage pits. storage areas. shades for humans and animals. activity areas. outdoor hearths. etc. Around the structures belonging to the central li\"ing area will normally be a zone \\·ith a heavy impact on the \"ege tation from traffic. lOilet activities. collection of fire\\·ood. bark for roofing. etc . This can also be regarded as a part of the sett lement as far as it is a zone \\·here daily and regular activities are carried out. Such zones can probab ly be observable in the vegetation for hundreds and in some cases thousands of years (Gron el al. 1999: Holm-Olsen el al. 1999).

As archaeo logists \\·e tend to think of Stone Age 'settl ements · as features \\"ith a size closely rclated to the concentrations of material we excavate. Ne\\"ell even states:

"the maximulll distribution of the retouched tools is a more reliable indicator of the sett lement area (tota l activity area) than is the maximum distribution of the waste material (possible midden . etc.r·

(Newe ll 1973) . I have earlier arg ued that a single archaeological settlement may consis t of several contem­poraneous d\\·ellings reflected as several concentrations of materi al (Oron 1987). Meal1\\·hile this point of view still seems too restricted.

At an Evenkian settlement we visited in 1999 and 2000. the area with structures related to the sett lement is about 600x500 metres. If one includes an old storage platform

still in use. even though it originally belonged to another camp. the area illcreases to nearly i .OOOx500 metres . The surrounding zone \vith a visible impact from cutt ing firewood. taking bark from the larch trees, etc. , has a radius of several kilometres. The site was inhabited by 5 persons in 1999 and 4 in 2000. This is a large area for a site according to Evenkian standards, but even the structures of ·small· sites will seldom take up an area smaller than 20x20 to 30x30 metres. In addition to this comes the ·impacl-zone·.

Ifa settlement is used for longer stays, it is nonnal to place the platfol111s and other external structures at a greater distance from the dwellings than ifit is used on ly for shorter stays. Thus. there is a direct relation between the area a settlement takes up and the length of the periods of occupation.

The areas the Evenkian settlements take up are considerably larger than the areas we normally excavate during im·estigations of Old Stone Age settlements . This fits data from other hunrer-gatherers (Turnbull 1962 : 10; Boas 1966:24: Yellen 1977: Johnson el al. 1999:66). That the older E\"enkian sites in the area look smaller than the more recent ones is most likely because many structures disintegrate \\·ith time and become 'invisible'. This 1110st likely also explains the "restricted size' of many Stone Age sites: we in vestigate only the areas where the well­preser\"ed lithic materials appear in significant con­centrations.

Where to pllt ti,e wastelre-circlliation of SOli Is

An understanding of how the prehistoric cultures handled and manipulated their waste is essential for our poss i­bilities of interpreting their sites. The way the Evenks dispose of their waste is complex and thought-provoking and a good example of the impact spiritual culture can have on the concrete handling of material objects.

The settlement surfaces are kept clean. For many waste categories there are special procedures of disposal that must be follQ\\"ed . These procedures seem generally to serve purposes related 10 the souls or rcmains of souls thought to be present in the \\"aste. Therefore it is obvious that mythology and cosmology not only play an important role for the spat ial organisa ti on of daily life on the settlements. but also to a high degree control the disposal of the \\·aste from it.

Old clothcs are regarded as sacred bccause they contain ·remains· of the soul of the person who wore them. Therefore they must not be placed so that they touch the ground \\·hen they are discarded. \Ve observed old clothes hanging on trees and on branches stuck into the ground in the old settlements. In some cases old platfonns are used for dumping old clothes. When pcople die it is normal to hang their clothes on a tree besides their grave or in the forest.

For humans. the idea of reinc am at ion is well described. Their souls can after a stay with the dead souls in the

220 Ole Gron and O/eg KlI:nefsov

lower world 'rerunl' to the clans 'storehouse ' of souls in the upper world wait ing for re-binh into the middle world ~ our real physical world (Anis imov 1963a; Vasilcvich 1963 ), With regard to the bear, who is regarded as human and even more intell igent than ill11nanS, it is not strange to fi nd documentation of a similar idea expressed in the spectacular bear cult. Meanwhile. the publi shed Siberian data on fe-ci rcula tion of the sou ls of the other consumed animals that make up the absolute majority ofthe di et is s urpr ising ly th in . This rather overlooked aspect is important because it has consequences for where and how the main part oftlle bones are deposi ted (Anisirnov 1963b: Paproth 1976) .

The bear ritua l exists in a number of different versions in the Evenkian culture (Pap roth 1976). In the northern pan of our area, the fo llowing vers ion is still in use. The dead bear is addressed grandfather/grandmother and other names, and the hunters tell it that they didn ' t kill it. The bones and the sku ll are 'buried' on a platform (a 'dalken ' or 'talken' with sides) simi lar to a traditional human burial structure in this area . Th is s tructure can be placed on the ki ll s ite or close to the se tt lement. There can be several bears on such a platform, but they cannot be deposited together wi th other animals . In the southern part of the Northelll Transbaika l (the area aro llnd Kalal' Village) they have never used platfonns but fonnerly buried the sku ll of the bear under a heap of stones with the face against the ground - so that it could not see who killed it.

The bones ofwiJd hoof-animals are put on a platform or in a ' halbo' (a log-built box standing on the ground). normally on the periphery of the sett lements. As with the bear, the idea is that the souls of the dead animals must feel good, so that their reincarnations will return to the same area. In this way it is thought that their population in the area can be maintained. Moose and musk deer are not regarded as hoof-animals. Their bones must not be placed on the platforms for these. The skull and pelvis of musk deer are put on young trees, often close to the sett lements. One can imagine that this re fl ects the fact that th e musk deer some times grazes on th e lower branches of the trees (Prikhodko and Ovsyanikov 1998) . a lthough the Evenks deny ever having observed such a thing. The moose bones may be deposi ted in the water. Th is also seems logica l, since thi s is where the moose grazes during summer. Sab le (Siberian marten) was trad itionally brought into the dwelling through a sacred opening at the rear. Afte r the fur has been removed. whal remains of the body is depositcd in a hole in a tree to

'bring him home' or placed on a small specialised platform near the settlement.

The deposi tiona l behaviour outlined here expla ins the problem we met from the start: there was almost no waste leO in the central parts of the sett lements, even though we knew they had been inhabited year after year. Generally. the platfo rms and ha lbos for depositio n of bones are located at some distance from each other 20 to some hundred metres behind the dwell ings 'just at the edge of

the forest'. It seems that the locations where musk deer bones are put on trees follow the same pattern.

Archacologica ll y, we may end up wi th a situation where the central settlement area apart from the dwell ing areas will appear as a dark 'culture layer ' (due to the re indeer dung) with vel)' few finds in it. Bear bones. bones of hoof-animals apart from musk deer and bones of sable will form separate concentrations beh ind the site if they are preserved,

\Vhen old platforms collapse. the bones tend to spread on the fores t floor due to animal activity. If the sett lement is occ upied. the inhabitan ts may decide to collect the bones and throw them in to the ri ver because the domesti ­cated re indeer may eat them to get ca lc ium and become ill. Such waterlogged 'waste layers' will m ost ly be dispersed by the current in the ri \·ers. whereas they should be preserved in sinl in mos t lacustrine situations.

Archaeological implications - conclusion

The resu lts presented here from the NOl1hem Transbaikal are in themselves only \'alid as inspiring examples of how th e re lat ion between inhabited se ttlements and their archaeological remains can be. No general mode l fo r solving the problem of archaeological in terpretation is postu lated. \Ve can conclude that:

a \\' ith the Evenks studied. the dwell ings and sett le­ments are organ ised spatially in accordance with a se t of rules tha t are formall y 'explained' by cosmo­logy and mythology.

b The dwell ing fl oors of branches may serve as traps for small objects that can yield sta tements about the organi sation of the dwelling space - even though the dwellings have been inhabited several times.

c The settlement sizes we operate wi th for hun ter­gathe rer settlements in archaeology seem unrealistic­ally sma ll.

d The manipulation of the major find category in th is case - the bones - is Cn0I1110U S. and diffe renl spatia l procedures are used for the bones of different anima l species.

The impl ication of these observations is that one must take the possibi lity of manipulation of the archaeo logical material in accordance with spiritually based rules and customs very seriously when interpreting prchistoric settlements. Especial ly the study of material from outside dwell ings appea rs problematic. whe reas the study o f material from inside the dwellings can provide a basis fo r some opt imism .

The usc of strict spatial rules by different cu ltures fo r their organisation of the dwelling spaces seems fro m an archaeological poi nt of view to be one of the most use ful genera l features observed in social anthropology . Because it provides an interface between spiri tual and materi al culture, we have a chance of extracting in fonnation about the social organisation of prehistor ic hunting socie ties in

Elhno-arclwe%gy among E\'enkian jaresl hunters 22 1

cases where the cultural and natural con dit ions have preserved traces of it.

Whereas graves as well as the dwelling areas of the settl ements may re fl ect aspects of the social organisation of prehi storic soc iet ies. the fo rme r do not represent ordinary daily-life situations as those found in dwellings. Because the relatives of the deceased in a burial situation will reac t to an extreme situation, their actions are unlikely to re fl ect da il y life. They may . in sLlch a situati on, accentuate and maybe even overemphasise aspects of the soc ial organisation that are not vis ible in daily life . The studies of soc ial organ isation based on the material from settlements and from graves will therefore most likely supplement each other.

The preliminary resu lts \\'e ha\·e obtained from our ex pedit ions to Transbaikal stress the importance of a continuat ion of the careful registrat ion and documenta tion of the Evenk trad ition. Especially the possibi lities of gaining an understanding of the re lation bcm'een sett le­ment behav iour, use of and handling ofnanJ rai resources. and cosmo logy appear important.

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