Abay Namen is a Postdoctoral Scholar investigating Palaeolithic archaeology of Kazakhstan and Central Asia at Nazarbayev University. His research focuses on reconstructing early human behaviour at Palaeolithic sites through the analysis of stone tools and raw materials. Dr. Namen is currently focused on the excavation of several open-air loess sites in the piedmonts of the Ili Alatau range, south-eastern Kazakhstan. He is also part of the international team investigating cave sites in Turkestan Province. 

Educational background:

1. Dr. rer. nat., University of Tübingen, Germany, 2022
2. M.Sc., La Sapienza Universita di Roma, Italy, 2017
3. M.Sc., University of Evora, Portugal, 2017
4. BA, Al Farabi Kazakh National University, Kazakhstan, 2015

Namen, A., Schmidt, P., Varis, A., Taimagambetov, Z., Iovita, R. 2022. Preference for Porphyry: Petrographic Insights into Lithic Raw Material Procurement from Palaeolithic Kazakhstan. Journal of Field Archaeology. doi.org/10.1080/00934690.2022.2092265

Namen, A., Cuthbertson, P., Varis, A., Schmidt, P., Taimagambetov, Z., Iovita, R. 2022. Preliminary results of the first lithic raw material survey in the piedmont zones of Kazakhstan. Asian Archaeology. doi.org/10.1007/s41826-022-00051-3

Namen, A., Varis, A., Lindauer, S., Friedrich, R., Taimagambetov, Z., Iovita, R. 2022. Nazugum, a 4000 year old rockshelter site in the Ili Alatau, Tian Shan. Archaeological Research in Asia. doi:10.1016/j.ara.2022.100370

Namen, A., Iovita, R., Nickel, K., Varis, A., Taimagambetov, Zh., Schmidt, P., 2022. Mechanical properties of lithic raw materials from Kazakhstan: Comparing chert, shale, and porphyry. PLoS ONE. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0265640 

Varis, A., Miller, C., Cuthbertson, P., Namen, A., Taimagambetov, Z., Iovita, R., 2022. The Effect of Formation Processes on The Frequency of Palaeolithic Cave Sites in Semi-Arid Zones: Insights From Kazakhstan. Geoarchaeology. doi:10.1002/gea.21909

Cuthbertson, P., Ullman, T., Büdel, C., Varis, A., Namen, A., Seltmann, R., Reed, D., Taimagambetov, Zh., Iovita, R., 2021. Finding karstic caves and rockshelters in the Inner Asian mountain corridor using predictive modelling and field survey. PLoS ONE. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0245170

Iovita, R., Varis, A., Namen, A., Cuthbertson, P., Taimagambetov, Z., Miller, C.E., 2020. In search of a Paleolithic Silk Road in Kazakhstan. Quaternary International. doi:10.1016/j.quaint.2020.02.023

Namen, A., Varis, A., Cuthbertson, P., Iovita, R., Taimagambetov, Zh., 2020. Predvaritel’nye itogi razvedovatel’nykh rabot proekta PALAEOSILKROAD: mul’tidistsiplinarnyi podkhod v issledovaniyakh [Preliminary results of the PALAEOSILKROAD project: multi-disciplinary approach]. Proceedings of the International scientific and practical conference “Great Steppe in light of archaeological and interdisciplinary research”, Vol. 2, pp. 60-69. (In Russian)

ANT 233 – Cavemen, Mammoths, and Sabertooths;

Stone Age Archaeology of Eurasia – Lecture, Section-1