Chapter 1 provides a summary of the distribution of obsidian sources and history of obsidian studies in Northeast Asia. Chapter 2 introduces various methods of establishing obsidian provenance and representative models of obsidian acquisition and distribution and describes recent archaeological research trends. Chapter 3 presents the spatiotemporal framework of Northeast Asian archaeological cultures relevant to obsidian studies. Chapters 4 to 7 present the current stages of obsidian provenance and archaeological research in Northeast Asia. The regions discussed are the southern Russian Far East, Korea and north-east China, the Japanese Islands, Kamchatka and north-eastern Siberia. Chapter 8 discusses the patterns of human migration between sources and archaeological sites across Northeast Asia based on provenance analysis. Chapter 9 raises the issue of the existent state of human movement and exchanges across oceans and straits in provenance studies. Chapter 10 concludes that obsidian is the key to prehistoric exchange and contact in the North Pacific Rim. The Appendix presents numerical data on the geochemical composition of the primary sources of obsidian.
This book is the first synthesis of obsidian studies that cover the entire Northeast Asian region. Since the first geochemical analysis of obsidian by J.R. Cann and Colin Renfrew (Reference Cann and Renfrew1964), obsidian provenance studies have developed rapidly, including Neutron Activation Analysis (NAA), X-ray Fluorescence (XRF) Analysis (both Energy XRF, ED-XRF, and Wavelength Dispersive XRF, WD-XRF), and four other analytical methods that have been carried out worldwide.
The author’s original field of study was southern Russian Far East, Kamchatka and north-eastern Siberia, and this part of the book is the most detailed and unrivalled by researchers from other countries. Beyond that, the author has conducted archival research and fieldwork in Japan, Korea and north-eastern China and has attempted to summarise as much of the research as possible from the same perspective as the original research and present the results. In Chapter 6, the author outlines the current status of the Japanese Islands, which have been studied the most in Northeast Asia and have accumulated the majority of data for obsidian provenance research. It gathers in detail the state of research in the Japanese archipelago—from the north (Hokkaido and central Japan including Tokyo) to the Ryukyu Islands, including Kyushu and Okinawa, in the south—and covers obsidian exchanges with the southern-most part of the Korean Peninsula. The importance of the analysed cases of the Japanese archipelago in the obsidian provenance of Northeast Asia is explained. Although not mentioned in this book, the number of samples for XRF provenance in Japan accumulated until 2013, with 85 247 samples from the Jomon Age and 106 404 from the Upper Palaeolithic (Shimada Reference Shimada and Ono2019).
Another highlight in this book is Chapter 7. Here, the previously poorly understood classification of obsidian source groups in Kamchatka and the distribution of obsidian from two source localities, that is, Payalpan and Itkavayam, are discussed. At present, more than 30 geological sources in Kamchatka exist. For the first time, the results of an analysis of obsidian from Lake Krasnoe in the eastern-most part of Northeast Asia near the Bering Strait, which is almost unknown to the rest of the world, are presented. In addition, examples of the impressive long-distance transport of obsidian from this source to the Mesolithic Zhokhov site in the far north at 76°N, approximately 1500km north-west of the source site, which evidences the transport of obsidian, are included. This is a good example of the active migration of humans at the beginning of the Holocene, which may change our previous perceptions.
The study of obsidian provenance analysis has made steady progress and development since the 1960s. A pertinent question, however, is what happens when one tries to understand the relationship between obsidian provenance and archaeological sites as a reality of obsidian acquisition by human groups. The methods of obsidian acquisition and transportation patterns between the two points of the obsidian source and terminal archaeological site are not always the same. The results of the provenance analysis of these two points were certain. However, it is difficult to clarify the actual conditions of trade and other activities between the two points (or multiple intermediate points), even if they can be estimated theoretically.
The detailed results presented by the author in this book, linking the two points of the source and the archaeological site, are illuminating. This is because in terms of certainty, there is no other way to present a straight-line connection. Kuzmin further summarises the accumulation patterns between obsidian sources and archaeological sites by region for Upper Palaeolithic and Neolithic Northeast Asia (fig. 8.5, p.93). This presents a larger summary of the macro results of the provenance studies. As the author points out, obsidian is a reliable ‘independent proxy’ that can show the results of human migrations concerning stone acquisition. In this sense, this book stands on the phenomenological synthesis between sources and sites. The author has thoroughly researched and cited relevant articles, books and reports on obsidian provenance analysis and archaeological results in Northeast Asia, providing a comprehensive overview of the diverse body of research for readers interested in gaining a fuller picture of the region. This book is the first key publication to present the results of obsidian research in Northeast Asia to wider global research communities and interested readers.
