The question of the Paleolithic of Mangystau (Levallois-Achel or Mikok?)

The paper presents technical and typological characteristics of stone artifacts, which were collected on the III above-floodplain terrace of the Shakhpakatasai valley on the northern coast of the Mangystau peninsula, south of Sarytash Bay, in the area of the underground mosque – Shakpakata. It was these artifacts that served as the basis for A.G. Medoev’s identification of Levallois-Achel cultures 1 and 2. These concepts are widely used in generalizing works on the Paleolithic of Kazakhstan, although the materials remained unprocessed and unpublished due to the untimely death of the researcher. In 2018–2020 the authors conducted field and office work to localize collection points of 1966–1969, to process and describe collections, and attempted to interpret them. The artifacts lay on the surface of the third above-floodplain terrace of the through-valley Shakhpakatasai uncovered and unredeposited. In the sides of the valley thick layers of flint nodules are exposed, which served as an inexhaustible source of raw materials for making tools at different stages of the Stone Age. According to the degree of surface deflation the artifacts are subdivided into three series. Of particular interest are moderately deflated artifacts, including a significant number of bifaces and bifacial tools, which makes it possible to raise the question of including the early series of artifacts from Shakpakata workshop sites in the framework of the «Eastern Micoquien».