Radiocarbon chronology of woolly mammoth (Mammuthus primigenius) from Poland

Abstract

In Central Europe, a major gap in the radiocarbon chronology of Mammuthus primigenius has resulted from the absence of dated records in most of the area north of the Sudetes and Carpathian mountains. This paper presents almost 60 directly dated mammoth remains, based both on new research and published sources from the whole of Poland. The dates, ranging from ca. 54 to 15 cal. ka BP (51.8–12.6 ka BP), are correlated with Marine Isotope Stage 3 (MIS 3) and MIS 2 of the Late Pleistocene. The mammoth was able to colonise this region at least three to four times. The number of mammoths was probably reduced during the middle of MIS 3, between ca. 43.2 cal. ka BP (39.0 ka BP) and 40.6 cal. ka BP (35.9 ka BP), as well as between ca. 34.8 cal. ka BP (30.5 ka BP) and 32.1 cal. ka BP (27.4 ka BP). Also, at the beginning of MIS 2 ca. 27.5 cal. ka. BP (ca. 22.8 ka BP) woolly mammoth probably became very rare in the studied area until ca. 24 cal. ka BP (ca. 20.2 ka BP), the beginning of H2 cold event. In the middle of MIS 2, between ca. 24.1 cal. ka BP to ca. 18.3 cal. ka BP (ca. 20.2 ka BP to ca. 14.6 ka BP), Mammuthus withdrew from Poland entirely. From ca. 18.3 cal. ka BP (ca. 14.6 ka BP) to 15.0 cal. ka BP (12.6 ka BP) the mammoth reoccupied part of its former range, the south-eastern part of Poland (Lublin Upland) and the easternmost part of Sudetes foothills and the upper Odra river valley. The marked loss of open habitats at the beginning of the Lateglacial Interstadial was followed by the retreat and extinction of M. primigenius in southern Poland around 15.0 cal. ka BP (12.6 ka BP).

Introduction

Remains of Mammuthus primigenius are amongst the most common Late Pleistocene fossil finds of the mid and northern latitudes of the Northern Hemisphere. There is now sufficient chronometric evidence available for a reconstruction of the spatiotemporal pattern of extinction of the woolly mammoth from Europe and Asia (Stuart et al., 2002, Stuart et al., 2004, Stuart, 2005, Álvarez-Lao et al., 2009, Kuzmin, 2010) as well as North America (Agenbroad, 1989, MacPhee, 2007, Álvarez-Lao et al., 2009). Whereas the extinction of the mammoth seems to be well-known for most of western, southern and north-eastern Europe (e.g. Stuart et al., 2002, Stuart et al., 2004, Ukkonen et al., 2008, Aaris-Sørensen, 2009, Álvarez-Lao et al., 2009, Sommer and Benecke, 2009), in some regions of central Europe there has been a major gap in the radiocarbon chronology resulting from the absence of dated records.

In Poland a very large number of fossil remains of M. primigenius have been discovered over the last 170 years. Kowalski (1959) reported over 220 localities from this area. New fossils of mammoth from Poland have come to light during the last few decades, when, gravel-pits and Palaeolithic sites have been excavated. The bones of M. primigenius have been frequently found in the Late Pleistocene sediments of southern Poland. Kubiak (1965) added almost 50 new sites to the previously known list from the foothills of the Polish Carpathians. These were mostly finds of tusks, molars or isolated bones without archaeological context or confirmed geological provenance. Amongst these numerous remains two spectacular, almost complete, skulls of mammoth are included from Dębica and Bzianka near Rzeszów (Kubiak, 1980) (Fig. 1). Remains are often found during the exploitation of gravel-pits, such as that in Krosinko near Poznań (Lorenc and Pawłowska, 2010), river banks or even accidentally during cartographic work such as the recent discoveries in Janowice, in the Outer Western Carpathians (Cieszkowski et al., 2010). Remains of single mammoth individuals are known from sites such as Niedzica in the Pieniny Mountains (Kulczycki and Halicki, 1950), Skaratki near Łowicz (Chmielewski and Kubiak, 1962), Kraków Nowa Huta (Kozłowski et al., 1970), Zemborzyce near Lublin (Jakubowski, 1972), Warszawa (Jakubowski, 1973), Wrocław-Oporów (Wiszniowska et al., 2003), Hallera Av.-Wrocław, site 1 (Wiśniewski et al., 2009a), and Zastruże near Strzegom (Wiśniewski et al., 2009b, Krzemińska et al., 2010). On the other hand, in caves, only isolated mammoth bones or teeth have been found (Wojtal, 2007) e.g. in Obłazowa Cave near Nowy Targ in the Carpathians (Kubiak, 2003) and in Komarowa Cave in the Częstochowa Upland (Nadachowski et al., 2009). However, most of the new remains, sometimes in large numbers, were collected from open-air archaeological sites and usually from well-recognized stratigraphical contexts. The best known are those of the Kraków Spadzista Street complex (Kozłowski and Kubiak, 1972, Kozłowski et al., 1974, Kozłowski et al., 1975, Kozłowski and Sobczyk, 1987, West, 1996) where, in the Kraków Spadzista Street (B) site alone, an assemblage of more than 8000 remains belonging to at least 86 individuals has been found (Wojtal and Sobczyk, 2005, Kalicki et al., 2007, Wojtal, 2007) (Fig. 2).

New direct dates of material comprising the remains of M. primigenius have come from many parts of Poland. This paper, for the first time, presents a significantly higher number of radiocarbon dates on mammoths from the area north of the Sudetes and Carpathian mountains.