The last Mesolithic hunter-gatherers at Damjili Cave, west Azerbaijan, the South Caucasus

Abstract

The advent of the Neolithic socio-economy in the South Caucasus probably resulted from the immigration and cultural spread from Southwest Asia and their interaction with local Mesolithic hunter-gatherer societies. Recent studies have revealed that the Neolithic Period began around ca. 6000 BC across the South Caucasus regions. However, the details of this process, including immigrant-local interactions and their regional variations, remain unclear. In this regard, the archaeological evidence obtained from Damjili Cave in western Azerbaijan is significant. Excavations conducted by the authors’ team between 2016 and 2022, yielded cultural remains from the late Mesolithic (ca. 6500-6000 BC) and Neolithic (ca. 6000-5300 BC) periods. Moreover, the stratigraphy has been firmly established by two dozen radiocarbon dates. Thus, for the first time in the South Caucasus, it became possible to examine the process by which a local Mesolithic hunter-gatherer society transformed into (or was replaced by) a Neolithic agro-pastoralist society at a single site. This presentation illustrates our research results, focusing on evidence of Mesolithic hunter-gatherer cultural remains, and provides observations on the relationship between the last Mesolithic and the first Neolithic societies in west Azerbaijan.