The transition from the Early to the Late Neolithic in the forest-steppe Trans-Urals

To date, approximately 50 Neolithic settlements and sites exhibiting diverse cultural traditions have been identified in the forest-steppe Tobol region. The interrelationships between these cultural groups, however, remain insufficiently studied. The article presents a comprehensive description and analysis of Neolithic artifacts recovered from the Ko-chegarovo I settlement. The lithic assemblage comprises 586 items, while the ceramic Neolithic assemblage consists of approximately 3,000 fragments, representing 122 vessels. The analysis of stone and ceramic products employed the following approaches: typological analysis, raw material identification according to I.V. Khvorova's classification, and chronological assessment based on 15 radiocarbon dates obtained from the Neolithic layer of the settlement. The set-tlement was inhabited during the first half of the 5th millennium BC by communities exhibiting both Early and Late Neo-lithic cultural traits. The most plausible interpretation of this pattern is the co-residence and close social ties between groups associated with the Kozlovo and Poludenka traditions, which is supported by the ornamentation patterns of the vessels. At the settlement of Mergen 7, ceramic vessels displaying hybrid features were documented, combining ele-ments of the early Kozlovo cultural tradition with traits characteristic of the late Poludenka and Makhandzhar traditions. The identification of settlements exhibiting transitional characteristics in both ceramics and lithic inventories allows us to designate the first half of the 5th millennium BC as a transitional phase marking the shift from the Early Neolithic cultural traditions to those of the Late Neolithic in the Trans-Urals.