Forskningsemne
Internasjonalt

Drozdovka Project

Houses and Settlement Patterns ca. 2000 BC at Drozdovka Fjord, Kola Peninsula, Russia.

Deltaker(e):
Bryan Hood, Knut Helskog (Tromsø Museum) and Vladimir Shumkin (Russian Academy of Sciences, St. Petersburg)

Prior to the 1990s, virtually no Stone Age houses were known from the Kola Peninsula. Since then, several different dwelling types have been identified, particularly at Drozdovka Fjord, 200 km east of Murmansk. Drozdovka is one of the better investigated areas of the Kola Peninsula, with surveys and excavations undertaken by Nina N. Gurina, Vladimir Shumkin and others. Our project builds on these earlier studies, but focusses on house structures dating to the period around 2000 BC. This time frame overlaps the end of the Stone Age/Neolithic and the beginning of the Early Metal Period.

Following preliminary surveys in 1992, excavations were conducted in 1994, 1998 and 2000 at the site of Ust-Drozdovka III. The site is located at the head of the fjord beside the outlet of a productive salmon river. There are 7-8 large pit houses and 2-3 smaller dwelling features. One of these, House 5, was selected for excavation.




Photo 1. Aerial View of Ust-Drozdovka. Ust-Drozdovka III is located a short distance from the center of the photo, 11 o'clock.

House 5 initially appeared to be a large Gressbakken-like dwelling. During the course of excavation, however, at least three occupation phases were revealed: an initial house, the entrance passage of which cut through an earlier cultural layer, and a second house that was built on top of the first, but at a right angle to it. The houses were surrounded and partly covered by a midden, which was up to 80 cm deep. This midden contained a large quantity of fire-cracked rock, stone tools and flakes, ceramics, as well as preserved tools and refuse of bone. Radiocarbon dates for the houses mostly lie between 2100-1500 BC.




Photo 2. Drozdovka excavation underway. Prior to excavation a large depression suggested a structure over 15 m long and about 10 m wide.




Photo 3. Drozdovka fully excavated. The long axis of the second house runs from foreground to background and contains a typical Gressbakken-like double hearth with clusters of heating/cooking rocks. The long axis of the first house runs left to right and the structure contains an unusual box-like hearth (right side).




Photo 4. The floor of the second house (presumably with remnants of the first) lies in the foreground. The yellow sand marks the wall of both houses. The entrance passage of the first house runs down the middle of the picture, clearly cutting through an earlier cultural layer (contact zone marked by arrows).

Excavation of the houses and midden produced a large artifact assemblage. The ground slate implements-- stemmed points, basally fluted points(Sunderøy type) and single edge knives-- are very similar to types known from Finnmark. Other tools, such as flint points, are not found in Gressbakken houses in Norway. But by far the largest portion of the lithic assemblage consisted of quartz, in the form of flakes (tens of thousands), bipolar cores and scrapers. This is also characteristic of similar houses in Norway. The ceramics are somewhat different from Finnmark, exhibiting small amounts of asbestos temper, occasionally tiny fragments of soapstone, and are mostly undecorated. A large quantity of raw and partially worked soapstone was associated with the houses. Some of this was used to produce small carvings or figurines. Several well preserved decorated bone implements were recovered from the midden. A possible small piece of bronze was found in the floor midden of House 1.






Photo 5. Ground Slate Points.






Photo 6. Flint Points.






Photo 7. Ceramics. The specimen on the left is clearly asbestos tempered.






Photo 8. Soapstone Elk (Moose) Figurine.






Photo 9. Decorated Bone Comb Fragment.



The midden surrounding and partially filling the houses consisted mostly of fire-cracked rock and quartz debitage, but certain areas (particularly those with mussel shell) had preserved faunal material. Most of this consisted of seal and reindeer, but small amounts of fish (cod and salmon), bird and small mammals were also present. A single walrus metacarpal was recovered.





Photo 5. Russian colleague Vladimir Shumkin excavates a bone deposit (mostly reindeer and seal) on the floor of the first house.


Other Sites in Drozdovka Fjord

A large number of sites have been registered in Drozdovka Fjord, some of which contain the remains of pit houses. On the west side of the fjord, the Komzha site has several large Gressbakken-like houses as well as a number of smaller, less distinct structures of different forms. Photo 6 depicts one of the Gressbakken-like dwellings from Komzha. Photo 7 shows another Gressbakken-like house on an island near the mouth of the fjord.




Photo 6. Gressbakken-like house at Komzha.




Photo 7. Gressbakken-like house on an island near the mouth of Drozdokva Fjord.


One of the most famous sites on the Kola Peninsula is located in the outer fjord area: Majak II. Excavated by Nina Gurina in the late 1970s- early 1980s, Majak II consisted of a midden up to 80 cm deep, but lacked pit-houses. Part of the site dates to the Neolithic (radiocarbon dates 5000-2500 BC), but most of the assemblage pertains to the Early Metal Period. Among the Early Metal Period finds are a small soapstone lamp and a soapstone mold for a metal axe. The midden contained ca. 270,000 fragments of bone, mostly of seals (Harp and gray), but also fish, bird and reindeer. Several individuals of walrus and polar bear were also recovered. Unfortunately, the bone material was simply lumped into coarse "Neolithic" and "Early Metal Period" components, identified in the field, then mostly left on-site. It is therefore impossible to undertake a thorough reanalysis.




Photo 8. Overview of Majak II. The midden lies in the vegetated area below and to the left of the red marker on the rock outcrop.


Project Progress
The artifact material from House 5 at Ust- Drozdovka III has been catalogued, but is not yet entered into a digital database. Digitized floor plans and profiles are nearing completion. Over a dozen radiocarbon dates have been run so far. Specialist analyses of the faunal material and soil chemistry have been completed in St. Petersburg. We hope to begin analysis of the houses and middens once the database is complete.

The material from House 5 will be combined with survey results from elsewhere in Drozdovka Fjord and the excavated collections from Majak II in order to develop a preliminary picture of Early Metal Period settlement in the fjord. The Drozdovka data will then be integrated with those from Norway to develop interpretations of settlement and society along the Barents Sea coast ca. 2000 BC.

Acknowledgements
This project was funded by grants from the Norwegian Research Council, the Barents Secretariat and the University of Tromsø.