A Review of the Evidence for Extinction Chronologies for Five Species of Upper Pleistocene Megafauna in Siberia

Abstract

A review of the radiocarbon chronology of some late Upper Pleistocene mammals from Siberia is presented. Previously published data has been supplemented by new 14C dates for 5 species (woolly mammoth, woolly rhinoceros, bison, horse, and muskox) to reconstruct chronological extinction patterns. The final extinction of woolly rhinoceros and bison in Siberia can be dated to approximately 11,000–9700 BP, but some megafaunal species (woolly mammoth, horse, and muskox) survived into the Late Holocene, about 3700–2200 BP.