Modern Analog Assemblages of Phytoliths Under Various Plant Communities of the Middle Volga and their Applicability for Archaeological Reconstructions

The article describes the results of investigations of the sub-recent assemblages of silica phytoliths in top soils of various modern plant communities of the Middle Volga region in Tatarstan, Samarskaya and Ulyanovskaya oblasts conducted in 2017–2020. Counts of various phytolith morphotypes from 40 samples suggest a relatively low level of vegetation community specificity as revealed by multivariate statistical analyses. Nevertheless, coniferous and mixed forests can be distinguished based on the presence of a suite of conifer phytoliths, while steppes can be identified based on high proportion of rondels. Deciduous forests of the region can be detected based on high proportion of straight elongates and acutous bulbosus (trichome) type. Some matchings are made to 10 archaeological samples from various strata and ages across the region. Such samples reveal high proportion of cultured grass phytoliths and are most similar to steppes or agricultural assemblages in the modern dataset.