HOLOCENE PALEOENVIRONMENTAL HISTORY OF THE NORTHERN SEA OF JAPAN IN RELATION TO HUMAN OCCUPATION OF SOUTHERN PRIMORIE (RUSSIA) AND NORTHERN HOKKAIDO (JAPAN)

Paleoenvironmental change in the northern Sea of Japan included transformations of both marine and terrestrial biomes in a region at the boundary between North Temperate and Subarctic zones. Throughout the Holocene, eustatic and tectonically-related changes in sea-level resulted in a series of marine transgressions and regressions that transformed coastlines and affected marine productivity as well as seasonal drift ice, in turn affecting populations of sea-mammals, anadromous fish, and shellfish. These changes were related to patterns of human coastal occupation and resource harvesting in areas such as Boisman Bay in southern Primorie and Rebun Island in northern Hokkaido. In addition, although boreal elements of regional forests were generally restricted to higher elevations through most of the Holocene, cooler periods appeared to have affected the availability of mast resources and associated terrestrial wildlife, especially cervid populations. Late Holocene paleoenvironmental cooling, beginning ~2000 yr BP, seems to be associated with sea-level regression, drift ice expansion, and vegetational change that are in turn correlated with the origins of whaling and the end of the long sequences of generalized maririme hunter-gatherer cultures of Japan (Jomon Culture) and the Russian Far East (Mesolithic, Neolithic, and Paleometal Cultures).