Secrets of the ancient Aries. Digest of articles. S. V. Zharnikova

Pechora region, right bank of the Pechora River), Sungir (near Vladimir), Bear Cave (upper reaches of the Pechora River, foothills of the Northern Urals), Ostrovskaya (500 km to the south Bear Caves), Kapovaya Cave with wall cave painting (upper reaches of the Belaya River, mountainous region of the Southern Urals), and, of course, Kostenki on the Don River.

      Archaeologists note that they all belong to the period of the Molo-Sheksna interglacial period, which lasted practically from 50—48 millennia BC. up to 24—23 millennia BC).

      «Kostenkovo-Streletskaya culture of the early period of the Late Paleolithic, leading its beginning from the Mousterian era» (which ends with the end of the Mikulinsky interglacial), reached by the beginning of the Ostashkovsky glaciation (24—23 millennia BC) «an amazingly high degree of development, not inferior to in many respects to later archaeological cultures.»

      Thus: «Achievements of the material and spiritual culture of the population of Eastern Europe during the Molo-Sheksna interglacial period underlie, in turn, the highest flowering of the late Paleolithic culture of this region, which took place in the early period of the Ostashkov glaciation.»

      Archeology confirms that by the beginning of the cold snap, vast settlements existed in the center and north of the Russian Plain, which «testify to the complex domestic and economic activities, the high level of culture, reflected not only in numerous remarkable works of art, but also in a highly developed and varied homebuilding technique. These monuments allow us to draw a definite conclusion about the significant population of the preglacial zone of the Ostashkov glacier at a time when the climate became more severe. The population led a sedentary lifestyle and provided itself with stocks of vital resources for the winter.»

      Archaeologists speak of «long ground dwellings with hearths in the center, surrounded by small dugouts in combination with storage pits.» In these «strong and long-term dwellings of the population of the Russian Plain» there are a large number of «grater pestles and real grain-grinding slabs of granite, quartzite and Shoksha sandstone. Cooking plant foods in ordinary ways, similar to those used in agricultural crops, in the Paleolithic is a rather rare phenomenon, but not exclusive».

      The authors of «Paleolithic USSR» emphasize that «Finds of pestles-blackfishes are known in the Late Paleolithic monuments of other regions, but, perhaps, only in the south-west of the Russian Plain, they are found in such quantities, starting from the Mousterian industries and passing like a red thread through almost all the different cultural and different times of the Late Paleolithic industries».

      They testify that: «In recent decades, important data have been obtained that already in the Middle and especially in the Late Paleolithic (recall that this is the ancient Stone Age from 70 thousand BC to 12 thousand BC) forms of complicated gathering began to be widely used related to the processing and preparation of plant foods. Primitive archeology now possesses massive and indisputable materials proving a long prehistory of agriculture, which began at least from the end of the Middle Paleolithic era. In the south-west of the Russian Plain, for three or four tens of millennia, peculiar stone, sandstone pestles-grains in the form of small tablets, usually found together with stone slabs, developed and improved… The wide distribution of these tools indicates that the emergence of agriculture is preceded by various forms developed, complicated gathering associated with the preliminary complex processing of the collected plant food in the form of edible roots and grains».

      40—50, and maybe 70 thousand years ago, the population of the Russian Plain (our ancestors, by the way) collected cereals and ground them with grater pestles on stone graters, getting flour. Then the question arises – what were these cereals? The answer is given by the atlas-monograph «Paleogeography of Europe over the last hundred thousand years», where on the territory of the Russian Plain, during the Valdai glaciation, along with forests of birch, pine and spruce, stretching from the Carpathians to the Middle Pechora along the south-west-north east, there are huge meadow grass steppes stretching far to the north. It must be assumed that the grasses in these steppes were endemic to these latitudes, which require 18—20 hours of indirect solar irradiation and an abundance of moisture in the soil for normal vegetation. Such «plants of long daylight hours» (according to academician LS Berg) are rye, barley, oats, wheat, flax and peas. It is they who, apparently, made up the ancient meadow grass steppes of high northern latitudes.

      And if this is so, then the grain had to be collected. And women, of course, did this, since even at the beginning of the 20th century, as «stingy songs» testify, this work was performed by

      «girls, young people» (recording by Shane P. V., late 19th century):

      «Wheat in the field

      Ripe stood.

      May, may,

      Mayu, green!

      Ripe stood

      Waving a spike

      Waving a spike

      Her voice was hooting.

      «Girls, young men,

      Come out, reap!

      I cannot stand, wave a spikelet!».

      Or:

      «We reaped, we reaped

      Reaped, reaped, —

      Young reapers

      Sickles gold».

      Or:

      «Petrova’s wife

      On your own

      I went out early

      Daughters-winches

      Quail Daughters

      I took it out with me.

      «Reap, daughters-in-law,

      Reap, daughters!

      Winch daughters

      Quail Daughters!».

      And, finally, a full description of the process, which, apparently, has not changed in its structure from the Paleolithic to the present day, since this record was made in 1964 in the Pskov region (from E.F. Razumova):

      «А я, молодЕнька, рожь топчУ.

      Рожь топчУ, рожь топчУ.

      Травку-муравку вытопчУ,

      ВытОпчу, вытопчУ.

      ЗеленОе жито вырастёт,

      ВырАстет, вырастёт.

      А я, молодЕнька, буду жАть,

      БудУ жать, буду жАть.

      И да в снОпочки вязАть,

      Да вЯзать, да вязАть.

      И в сарай буду возИть,

      Да вОзить, да возИть.

      Да на раЮ буду садИть,

      Да сАдить, да садИть.

      Да сАдить, да садИть.

      И цепами буду молотИть,

      МолОтить, молотИть.

      У печи буду сушИть,

      Да сУшить, да сушИть.

      В квашне буду творИть,

      Да твОрить, да творИть.

      И рабочих всех кормить,

      Всех