Thousands of years before ancient humans in central Eurasia learned to farm, hunter-gatherer groups in the Subarctic built some of the first permanent, fortified settlements, challenging the idea that agriculture was a necessary condition for “settlement” societies. Researchers now believe that the oldest known fortifications in the icy north, though not in the world, date to a bend in the Amnya River in western Siberia.

The archaeological sites of Amnia have been officially excavated since 1987, but a recent radiocarbon study revealed the main pit at Amnia Site I, and the fortifications there date back to around 8,000 years ago. The ancient building (circled in red in the image below) is now just a large depression in the ground, but it was once protected by a moat and possibly another pit. Radiocarbon dating shows that the structure was built in the last century of the 7th millennium BC.

Later, in the sixth millennium BC, two more ditches were built behind this area. These objects, along with several other buildings, banks, and fences, represent a period when the area was more consistently inhabited. The Amnya II site was also built during this period, approximately 50 meters to the east (shown in green in the diagram above).

Both sites challenge traditional ideas about what hunter-gatherer groups were capable of, according to an international team of archaeologists led by researchers from the Free University of Berlin. It is clear that not only agricultural communities built permanent fortified settlements in the Stone Age.

“Our new paleobotanical and stratigraphic studies show that the inhabitants of Western Siberia led a complex lifestyle based on the rich resources of the taiga environment,” says archaeologist Tanya Schreiber from the Institute of Prehistoric Archeology in Berlin.

The West Siberian taiga is the habitat of coniferous forests, sometimes found in the subarctic. Around 6000 BC For example, there were herds of deer and reindeer in the taiga near Amni, and fish such as pike and salmon swam in the river. In such fertile areas, even mobile foraging groups have good reason to protect their supplies from opportunistic raiders or hungry neighbors.

Although it’s unclear exactly what (or why) the fortifications at Amnia were protecting, researchers suspect the site likely contained excess food such as fish oil, fish, and meat that had been smoked and preserved for storage.

“They don’t need to grow or raise resources,” Piezonka said Scientific magazine Andrew Curry. “The environment provides these things seasonally. It’s like harvesting nature.”

The elaborately decorated pottery remains found at the site are probably containers in which food was stored. It is unclear whether the buildings in the Amnia areas were occupied or protected year-round. But it appears to have been inhabited, at least for some seasons, by a group of hunter-gatherers in Western Siberia.

Many other Stone Age castles have been found in this part of the world, but none are as old as the site of Amnius I. Similar areas in Europe appear only centuries later and only after the beginning of agriculture.

“Fortification construction by groups of foragers has been observed sporadically in various parts of the world – mostly in coastal areas – since late prehistoric times, but the very early onset of this phenomenon in the interior of Western Siberia is unprecedented.”; Write an international team of archaeologists.

Traditionally, archaeologists assumed that foraging societies were not ‘sophisticated’ enough to build monumental, permanent structures that needed to be supported or defended socially or politically.

However, ongoing research at Cape Amnia and other archaeological sites around the world shows that crop cultivation and animal husbandry were not the only incentives for such activities. Göbekli Tepe, for example, is a massive stone complex built approximately 11,000 years ago in modern-day Turkey. It was built before the advent of agriculture and is considered the oldest known megalith in the world. Hunter-gatherers appear to have gathered in this area to bid farewell to their dead or to perform sacred ceremonies.

Similarly, archaeologists have discovered at the Amnya site in Siberia ‘hillsMounds defined as ‘large-scale ritual structures in the landscape’.

Researchers suspect that climate change around 8,000 years ago created the basis for abundant seasonal resources in Western Siberia, leading to human migration. Improvements in fishing and hunting strategies or improvements in food storage may have led to a surplus of food that needed to be preserved.