The Yana Rhinoceros Horn Site (Yana RHS) is an Upper Paleolithic archaeological site located near the lower Yana River in northeastern Siberia, Russia. It lies north of the Arctic Circle in the western part of Beringia. The site was discovered in 2001 when thawing and erosion revealed animal bones and artifacts. Cold conditions helped preserve the site’s cultural layer, which includes hundreds of animal bones, ivory items, and tools. These findings suggest that people lived there for a long time and had advanced technology. The site is about 32,000 years old and is the oldest known evidence of human settlement north of the Arctic Circle. People who lived there hunted many types of animals, and the site shows the earliest clear proof that humans hunted mammoths.

A 2019 genetic study found that the remains of two young male humans found at the site, dating to about 31,600 years ago, belong to a distinct genetic group called Ancient North Siberians (ANS).

The Yana RHS is older than some earlier sites in Siberia, such as Ust-Ishim (with human remains, 45,000 years ago), Kara-Bom (about 46,620 years ago), Kara-Tenesh, Kandabaevo, and Podzvonskaya.

Discovery

In 1993, Russian geologist Mikhail Dashtzeren discovered a part of a spear made from the horn of a woolly rhinoceros in the Yana Valley. This discovery happened after the ground thawed and eroded, which revealed many artifacts and animal bones nearby. With Dashtzeren's help, an Upper Paleolithic site called Yana RHS was found in 2001 by archaeologist Vladimir Pitulko and his team. Excavations at the site began in 2002.

Location

The Yana RHS is located on a flat area near the left side of the Yana River, north of the Arctic Circle, about 100 kilometers south of where the river flows into the sea. It is found far to the west in a low area between the Yana River in the west and the Kolyma River in the east. The site includes several areas that were used at about the same time, spaced tens or hundreds of meters apart, covering more than 3,500 square meters. At three of these areas (Northern Point, Yana B, and Tums1), a layer showing signs of human activity is well preserved. At three other areas (Upstream Point, ASN, and Southern Point), only items found on the surface are present. At another location, now called "Yana Mass Accumulation of Mammoth" (YMAM), ivory hunters discovered a large number of mammoth remains, including more than 1,000 mammoth bones, in 2008.

Date

The site was dated using a scientific method called radiocarbon dating to about 32,000 years before present. This date is earlier than the time of the Last Glacial Maximum, which occurred around 21,000 years before present, and the site is more than twice as old as any other known human settlement in the Arctic. By the time of the Last Glacial Maximum, the culture represented by the Yana site no longer existed.

Faunal remains

At the site, hundreds of animal bones have been found in the exposed layer of soil. These bones come from many different species, including several that no longer exist today. The animals include woolly rhinoceros (Coelodonta antiquitatis), woolly mammoth (Mammuthus primigenius), Pleistocene hare (Lepus tanaiticus), steppe bison (Bison priscus), horse (Equus ferus caballus), musk ox (Ovibos moschatus), wolf (Canis lupus), polar fox (Vulpes lagopus), brown bear (Ursus arctos), Pleistocene lion (Panthera spelaea), wolverine (Gulo gulo), rock ptarmigan (Lagopus mutus hyperboreus), and reindeer (Rangifer tarandus). Reindeer were likely the main source of food for humans at this location. Evidence shows that humans hunted steppe bison, reindeer, and brown bear at the site. The variety of animal bones suggests that the people living there had a wide range of food sources.

Some animals may have been hunted for their fur. For example, hare skeletons are found in complete, connected positions, suggesting they were likely caught using snares to collect their pelts, which are lightweight and warm, rather than for their meat.

Before 2008, few mammoth bones were found at the site compared to bones from other mammals. This led to the belief that mammoths were not hunted for food but instead scavenged for their ivory and bones, which were used for tools and building materials. This idea changed when ivory hunters discovered another location nearby, now called "Yana Mass Accumulation of Mammoth" (YMAM), which contains about 1,000 mammoth bones from at least 26 individuals. At YMAM, over 95% of the animal remains are mammoth bones, compared to about 50% at Yana-B and only 3.3% at Northern Point. Recent research suggests that humans occasionally hunted mammoths, possibly every few years, which may be the earliest clear evidence of mammoth hunting by humans. It is likely that hunting mammoths was not primarily for food but for their ivory and bones, used as building materials, tools, and fuel. Some studies suggest that people at Yana RHS may have targeted young female mammoths with tusks of specific sizes and shapes to make better hunting weapons.

Artifacts

The Yana stone industry uses small pieces of stone, shaped with a simple method called knapping. Blades are very rare, and tiny blades called microblades are not found. Large tools are mostly made on one side or are incomplete two-sided tools. Among thousands of stone items found at the Yana site, no stone tools for hunting have been discovered. Instead, hunting tools seem to have been made from bone and ivory. Other stone tools found include chopping tools, scrapers, tools that look like chisels, and a hammer stone.

Organic materials, such as bone and ivory, are well-preserved at the site because of the permafrost. Between 2002 and 2016, around 2,500 bone and ivory items were found. These include parts of a rhinoceros horn and two mammoth ivory pieces that may have been shaped using a tool called a shaft-wrench, along with heating or steaming. These items are similar to those from the Clovis culture and are the earliest examples of two-sided bone rods. They are also the only example found outside the Americas. Other items include ivory tools, bone and ivory points, bone needles, a tool made from wolf bone, decorations, personal items, and hunting weapons.

Materials not found near the site, such as amber, were used to make ornaments like pendants. This suggests the Yana people traveled widely or were part of large trade networks.

Over 1,500 beads have been found at the site, some painted with red ochre. These include rounded beads made from mammoth ivory and tubular beads made from hare bones. Pendants were made from reindeer teeth, herbivore teeth, and sometimes carnivore teeth or minerals like amber. One pendant was made from anthraxolite shaped like a horse or mammoth head. Ivory hair band ornaments are also found. Three-dimensional items are less common but include 19 antler figurines, likely showing mammoths, three decorated ivory containers, and two mammoth tusks with engravings that may show hunters or dancers.

The large number and variety of items found show that people lived at the site for a long time and had advanced culture and technology.

Relationship to other cultures

Archaeologists have observed similarities between the Yana RHS and the Clovis culture. These similarities include their methods of making stone tools and their unique spear foreshafts.

Archaeogenetics

Human teeth, dated to about 31,630 years ago, were discovered at the Northern Point locality. DNA from two of these teeth, which came from two unrelated males, was analyzed in a study by Sikora et al. (2019). The DNA was found to belong to a unique group of ancient people called the Ancient North Siberians (ANS). This group is believed to have descended from early West Eurasians (related to the Kostenki-14 population), with a mix of genetic material (about 22% to 50%) from early East Asians (related to the Tianyuan population). Scientists estimate that the Yana population, which includes these individuals, separated from early West Eurasians around 38,000 years ago.

Both individuals from the Yana site were found to share mitochondrial haplogroup U and Y chromosome haplogroup P1.