Abundant plant phytoliths from pits inside the structure and the well (pit 10) were studied by Arlene Rosen and Alison Weisskopf (2003) at University College, London; and pollen was studied by Laura Popova of the University of Chicago. The phytoliths generally did not include hulls or florescent parts, which suggests that the plants were harvested in the fall or winter. Most of the phytoliths came from Phragmites reeds and sedges, which are marsh plants. Phragmites reeds used for roof thatching are normally harvested in the fall or winter after the first frost has stripped away the leaves and florescent parts; thatchers need and use only the reeds. Perhaps most of the Phragmites reeds at KS were used for roof thatching, since almost all of them were fall/winter-harvested. Currently there is only one type of Phragmites that grows in the Samara Oblast, Phragmites australis, so this is probably the Phragmites that was present during the LBA. It is possible that the phytoliths from inside the structure were dominated by the remains of a collapsed thatched roof.
 Phragmites multi-celled phytolith from Krasnosamarskoe.
Pollen recovered from pits within the structure was dominated by terrestrial and aquatic grasses (Poaceae) but also included forest plants that bloom during the spring and summer, such as Dianthus (in flower from June to September), Gagea (flowers in March through May), Clematis (in flower during July and August), and Campanula (flowers in June to August). These plants occurred consistently in pits with arboreal pollen, which was between 8-17% of the total pollen count in pit and floor contexts. Similarly, pits in the northeastern section of the structure all have traces of Galium pollen; Galium flowers in July and August and is used to curdle milk. The structure pits also contained pollen of the Cichorium type (chickory), as well as Urtica (nettle) and Apiaceae (carrot or parsley). These useful food or medicinal plants bloom in the spring and summer and were common within the structure. Pit 11 contained leaf phytoliths from Phragmites reeds harvested in the summer, perhaps for food. It is still common practice in the villages of Russia to harvest the rhizomes and roots of Phragmites and process them into sweet-tasting (up to 5% sugar) flour (Duke 1979). Phytoliths and pollen corroborate the evidence from animal teeth, confirming that the KS settlement was occupied during all seasons.
Activity area Y had the remains of a low-density fall-season activity. Pike-Tay’s analysis showed the cattle here were butchered in the late fall. Artifact density by weight at excavation Y was 34gm/m3 of excavated soil, half of that at the large herding camp at Peschanyi Dol (PD)1 (78gm/m3), or about the same as the small herding camp at PD2 (37gm/m3). The Y activity area, just 200m south of the KS structure, was not another house site, since artifact density at the KS house site was 1200gm/m3. Dates from the Y excavation show that it was contemporary with the KS structure, so people from the KS structure probably created the Y deposit. Bone preservation was better than at the herding camps but poorer than in the KS structure, and carnivore chewing marks were rare at excavation Y, so even at this ephemeral late fall activity area the discarded bones probably were buried.
Season of use at the Peschanyi Dol herding camps:
The preservation of dental roots, necessary for incremental banding studies of seasonality, was excellent at KS and good at activity area Y. In contrast, bone and tooth preservation was poor at the PD herding camps, so we could not recover data on their season of occupation. The poor condition of the animal bone at the PD herding camps was a direct result of the very different kind of occupation these sites represented, so in that sense the loss of data was informative. Nerissa Russell of Cornell University determined that the PD animal bones were discarded into open fires or on the ground. Some were chewed by carnivores, digested, and weathered. The chewing marks of dog-sized carnivores and one actual dog bone indicate that dogs were present in the herding camps.
Samara Valley Project
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