Role and Place of the Irkutsk School of Archaeology
in Rescue Excavations in the Flood Zone of the Boguchany HPP

D. G. Korovushkin

List of issues > «Geoarchaeology, Ethnology, and Anthropology Series». 2024. Vol 47

Role and Place of the Irkutsk School of Archaeology in Rescue Excavations in the Flood Zone of the Boguchany HPP

Full text (russian)

Author(s)

D. G. Korovushkin

Abstract

The article presents a historical and historiographic excursion into long-term archaeological research of Irkutsk archaeologists, paleoanthropologists and geomorphologists in the Northern Angara region – in its part, now hidden by the reservoir of the Boguchany hydroelectric power station on the Angara River. For thousands of years, the Angara River has been the geographical core of Baikal-Yenisei Siberia – its archaeological and paleoethnic cultures, individual peoples and the modern multi-ethnic population of a vast and historically significant region. Research into the antiquities of the Angara region has been going on for almost a century and a half. They began with the historical trip of Nikolai Vitkovski and developed in the works of Bernhard Petri. The modern Irkutsk school of archeology, created by Professor German Medvedev as a continuation of more than a century of research traditions of the Irkutsk University, devoted great attention to the study of this unique historical and geographical phenomenon. Of course, the successful work of the Boguchany archaeological expedition would not have become possible without accumulating and taking into account the entire experience of field work on the Angara River, archaeological exploration and excavations carried out for decades by Irkutsk, Krasnoyarsk and Novosibirsk archaeologists. It is noted that numerous, often different-time and multilayered archaeological sites (monuments) (more than two hundred) have become not only vivid evidence of the culture of bygone centuries, but also, thanks to the multidisciplinarity of field and laboratory research, a scientific phenomenon that laid the foundations for future knowledge. It is concluded that it was the Irkutsk school of archaeology with its enviable attention to stratigraphy and decades of experience in penetrating the essence of things that became the cornerstone of the success of the entire Boguchany archaeological expedition. This publication is devoted to considering the results of this, in every sense, wonderful project, which was clearly manifested in one of the largest archaeological projects in post-Soviet Russia.

About the Authors

Korovushkin Dmitrii Georgievich, Doctor of Sciences (History), Professor, Siberian University of Consumer Cooperation; 26, Karl Marx av., Novosibirsk, 630087, Russian Federation, President of Research Fund “Heritage of Siberia”; 34, Vakhtangov st., Novosibirsk, 630058, Russian Federation, e-mail: peka1963@mail.ru

For citation

Korovushkin D. G. Role and Place of the Irkutsk School of Archaeology in Rescue Excavations in the Flood Zone of the Boguchany HPP. Bulletin of the Irkutsk State University. Geoarchaeology, Ethnology, and Anthropology Series. 2024, Vol. 47, pp. 13–23. https://doi.org/10.26516/2227-2380.2024.47.13 (In Russ.)

Keywords

Baikal-Yenisei Siberia, archaeological sites, multilayered sites, the stratified complexes, schools of sciences.

UDC

902(571.53)

DOI

https://doi.org/10.26516/2227-2380.2024.47.13

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