Shovkoplias, Ivan

Shovkoplias, Ivan [Шовкопляс, Іван; Šovkopljas], b 8 April 1921 in Lazirky, Lubny county, Poltava gubernia, d 13 June 1997 in Kyiv. Archeologist. A graduate of Kyiv University (1945), he worked in the Historical Museum of the Ukrainian SSR (1945–9) and then at the Institute of Archeology of the Academy of Sciences of the Ukrainian SSR (since 1949). A specialist in the Upper Paleolithic Period and the history of archeology in Ukraine, he excavated such important sites as the Dobranichivka archeological site in Kyiv oblast and the Mizyn archeological site in the Chernihiv region and published a monograph on that site in 1965. Shovkoplias is best known for his survey work Arkheolohichni doslidzhennia na Ukraïni, 1917–1957 (Archeological Studies in Ukraine, 1917–57, 1957) and the bibliographical Rozvytok radians'koï arkheolohiï na Ukraïni, 1917–1966 (The Development of Soviet Archeology in Ukraine, 1917–66, 1969). He also wrote a monograph on the Stone Age in Ukraine (1962) and a general survey of archeology (1964), and served as a member of the editorial committee for the three-volume Arkheolohiia Ukraïns'koï RSR (The Archeology of the Ukrainian SSR, 1971–5).

[This article originally appeared in the Encyclopedia of Ukraine, vol. 4 (1993).]