Published on: 2026-07-01
Source: Novosibirsk State University –
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Scientists from Novosibirsk, together with colleagues from other research centers in Russia, have recorded signs of a decrease in anthropogenic activity in the late Middle Ages in the soil archives of Western Siberia. They studied samples of deluvial (washed and re-deposited at the foot of slopes) soils taken from the central part of the taiga zone of Western Siberia, which allow for important conclusions about human activity in these areas. The results of the joint study are presented in the article “Between the bog and the slope: Colluvial soils of Siberian taiga and their potential for paleogeographical and geoarchaeological research,” published inin the journal Catena.
The authors of the article studied the remains of wildfires in the soils of the West Siberian swamps in the Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Okrug. The identified chronology of quantitative changes in charcoal in the soils was associated with catastrophic events for the ecosystems. Associate Professor of the Institute of Intelligent Robotics at NSU, Petr Menshanov, modeled the dynamics of the distribution of charcoal in the soils of the West Siberian swamps and found that it follows a simple linear law. Such linear dynamics allows modeling the chronology of events that have occurred in the territory of Western Siberia over the last thousands of years.
—Using Bayesian models to reconstruct the chronology of events, we were able to confirm the irregularity of charcoal appearances in soils. It turned out that charcoals appear less frequently during periods of significant climatic events occurring on Earth. Notably, the frequency of charcoal occurrences dropped after the arid climatic event 4,200 years ago, the Minoan eruption and the Bronze Age catastrophe, as well as after the climatic minimum of the Early Middle Ages., — he saidPetr Menshanov.
All these events did not stop the appearance of charcoals in the soils of Western Siberia, but only reduced the intensity of this process by a couple of hundred years. Such a correlation between the frequency of charcoal appearance and abrupt climate changes indicates a connection with an unaccounted variable causing fires, namely — the anthropogenic factor.
However, after the 12th century, the number of coals entering the soil of Western Siberia suddenly dropped to a minimum and did not recover for many years. Thus, simple coals from the swamp turned out to be involuntary markers of a catastrophe that occurred 7-8 centuries ago and drastically reduced the population living in Siberia. Researchers faced a natural question: what exactly caused such a sharp decline in human activity in this historical region, freeing vast territories of future Russia?
—Most likely, the decline in the number of charcoal remains in Western Siberia followed a non-climatic historical event that affected this territory in the 13th century — the Mongol invasion. However, it is doubtful that the Mongols managed to wipe out the Siberian population, which had hidden in the forests and swamps, or invented fire brigades and foresters, thereby reducing the number of fires in the region. The most probable cause of the observed drop in activity may have been the Black Death pandemic, which spread across Eurasia in the mid-14th century with the development of trade in the Mongol Empire. The Black Death claimed the lives of half of Europe’s entire population. The Mongols merely created conditions for the rapid spread of the epidemic across Eurasia. Therefore, swamp charcoal may indicate a mass die-off of the Siberian population caused by the plague.— explainedPetr Menshanov.
The age determination of biological material from 23 samples was conducted in three laboratories, using both the traditional liquid scintillation counting method (Institute of Geochemistry and Geophysics of the National Academy of Sciences of Belarus) and the accelerator mass spectrometry method (Poznan Radiocarbon Laboratory and the Center for Collective Use “Accelerator Mass Spectrometry NSU-NNC”).
“The Center for Collective Use ‘Accelerator Mass Spectrometry NSU-NNC’ provides researchers access to AMS dating and assists with the interpretation of obtained results when necessary. The development of domestic radiocarbon dating methods is in demand across a wide range of fields — from geoecology and paleogeography to history and forensics, and this study clearly confirms that,” noted Ekaterina Parkhomchuk, Director of the Center for Collective Use ‘Accelerator Mass Spectrometry NSU-NNC.’
Earlier, scientists from Novosibirsk studied the reasons why ancient people left the ancient settlement of Tartas-1 (Linkhttps://doi.org/10.1017/rdc.2025.10103) and established a connection between abrupt climate changes and Stone Age technological revolutions (Referencehttps://doi.org/10.17746/1563-0110.2026.54.1.025-033).
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