Аннотация:Paleopedology is a booming scientific discipline that studies the soils of the past geological epochsin order to assess the paleoenvironmental evolution. The scope of paleosol studies embraces not only soilsthemselves, but also the products of their involvement in biogeosphere cycles. This ensures the planetary roleof pedogenesis, which includes the transformation of the upper layers of the lithosphere leading to theincrease in fine earth, formation of new minerals, and residual or accumulative concentration of elements.In the geological history of the Earth, pedogenesis is realized within the framework of exogenesis, whichincludes weathering, soil formation, sedimentation, diagenesis, and geochemical migration. The pedolithosphererecords the critical points in the landscape evolution of the Earth from the very onset of the geologicalrecord, including the oxygenation of the atmosphere, the emergence of the higher plants and herbaceousbiomes, the dynamics of Interglacial–Glacial cycles, etc. Paleosols are the base for paleogeographic reconstructionsand predictive models of the future climate change. Paleopedology expands the horizons of soil sciencewithin the system of biogeosphere sciences and determines the development of new scientific disciplines—bacterial paleontology, paleogeochemistry, biogeomorphology, astropedology, geoarchaeology, ecologicalpaleopedology, soil paleocryogenesis and cryobiosphere studies. The historical dimension granted bypaleopedology makes pedology a mature historical science.