5 transcarpathian contacts of the late glacial societes of the polish lowlands Przegląd Archeologiczny Vol. 63, 2015, pp. 5-28 PL ISSN 0079-7138 Identiication of exotic raw-materials discovered within the context of Late Glacial societies of the North European Plain is a crucial factor in discussion about far-reaching exchange systems of goods and ideas. The present paper considers the occurrence of obsidian inds on the Polish Lowlands, hundreds of kilometers away from its sources located south of the Carpathians. The focus is on chemical recognition and identiication of a large and unique assemblage of obsidian artefacts from two Polish localities based on non-invasive Prompt Gamma Activation Analysis (PGAA). As a result, a clear connec- tion of northern Polish obsidians with its outcrops located on the northern (Slovakian) fringe of the Tokaj Mountains was established that is the irst detailed identiication of obsidian inds from the territory of Poland ever. A review of Polish and Slovakian obsidian assemblages from the Late Glacial times and the importance of obsidian exchange and mobility for Late Palaeolithic societies of Central Europe are discussed supported by analytical results of PGAA. KEY WORDS: obsidian, Late Glacial, Central Europe, Poland, Slovakia, Hungary, exchange, mobility, provenance, prompt gamma activation analysis IWONA SObKOWIAK-TAbAKA, ZSOLT KASZTOVSZKY, JACEK KAbACIńSKI, KATALIN T. bIRó, bOLGáRKA MARóTI, KATALIN GMéLING transcarpathian contacts of the late glacial societies of the polish lowlands 1. INTRODuCTION The Northern Hemisphere, due to periodi- cal glaciation periods in its history, witnessed a number of dramatic climatic changes that heav- ily inluenced human presence in the Northern part of Central Europe. During Last Glacial Maximum (between ca. 26.5-20 ka; Clark et al. 2009) most of the North European Lowland was either covered by ice-sheet or was an arctic desert devoid of any signs of life. Only at the very end of Pleniglacial (Greenland Stadial 2) Central European Lowland was available for human settlement unless the evidence of such an early occupation of that area is still under discussion (Terberger, Street 2002; Kabaciński, Sobkowiak-Tabaka 2012). However, there is no controversy that at the beginning of Late Glacial (Greenland Interstadial 1; ca. 14750 ka bP – björck et al. 1998; Lowe et al. 2008) groups of hunter-gatherers inhabited continuously vast areas of the European Northern Lowlands. Relatively fast climatic changes during the Late Glacial recorded in the Greenland ice-cores and other fossil archives led to transformation of arctic and shrub tundra en- vironment present at the beginning of the Late Gla- cial (Greenland Interstadial-1e) to open forest envi-