Paleoecology of a Multilayered Early Paleolithic Site Bairaki in Transnistria

The discovery of the Bayraki site in Transnistria showed how far from the ancestral homeland—the African continent—and how early (more than a million years ago) the ancestors of fossil man appeared in this region—in the basin of the lower Dniester. Six layers of Early Paleolithic artifacts were found in the section of the parking lot, both in the alluvial and the cover complex of the VII terrace of the Dniester. In the structure of the upper loess-soil strata, three paleosols of the lower and Middle Pleistocene and several levels of paleovresis are distinguished. The age-varying buried small erosive forms made it possible to clarify the number and stratigraphic position of the horizons of finds and paleosols. The two upper horizons of the Acheulian finds are associated with the medium reddish-brown paleosol and its pedosediment. The four lower horizons—the most ancient—are Oldovan, associated with different facies of the alluvial complex. People began to inhabit the f loodplain of the Dniester River about 1 million years ago, repeatedly returning to almost the same place for a long time.

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