scholarly journals Diverse genetic origins of medieval steppe nomad conquerors

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alexander S. Mikheyev ◽  
Lijun Qiu ◽  
Alexei Zarubin ◽  
Nikita Moshkov ◽  
Yuri Orlov ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Iron Age ◽  
Ethnic Diversity ◽  
Political Organization ◽  
Genetic Identity ◽  
Genetic Admixture ◽  
Ruling Class ◽  
Mixed Ancestry ◽  
Ruling Elite ◽  
Central Asian ◽  
Warrior Class

AbstractOver millennia, steppe nomadic tribes raided and sometimes overran settled Eurasian civilizations. Most polities formed by steppe nomads were ephemeral, making it difficult to ascertain their genetic roots or what present-day populations, if any, have descended from them. Exceptionally, the Khazar Khaganate controlled the trade artery between the Black and Caspian Seas in VIII-IX centuries, acting as one of the major conduits between East and West. However, the genetic identity of the ruling elite within the polyglot and polyethnic Khaganate has been a much-debated mystery; a controversial hypothesis posits that post-conversion to Judaism the Khazars gave rise to modern Ashkenazim. We analyzed whole-genome sequences of eight men and one woman buried within the distinctive kurgans of the Khazar upper (warrior) class. After comparing them with reference panels of present-day Eurasian and Iron Age populations, we found that the Khazar political organization relied on a polyethnic elite. It was predominantly descended from Central Asian tribes but incorporated genetic admixture from populations conquered by Khazars. Thus, the Khazar ruling class was likely relatively small and able to maintain a genetic identity distinct from their subjugated populations over the course of centuries. Yet, men of mixed ancestry could also rise into the warrior class, possibly providing troop numbers necessary to maintain control of their large territory. However, when the Khaganate collapsed it left few persistent genetic traces in Europe. Our data confirm the Turkic roots of the Khazars, but also highlight their ethnic diversity and some integration of conquered populations.

scholarly journals X-ray microscopy reveals the outstanding craftsmanship of Siberian Iron Age textile dyers

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Andreas Späth ◽  
Markus Meyer ◽  
Thomas Huthwelker ◽  
Camelia N. Borca ◽  
Karl Meßlinger ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Iron Age ◽  
Textile Production ◽  
X Ray ◽  
Organic Pigments ◽  
Central Asian ◽  
Metal Organic ◽  
Pigment Distribution

AbstractThe excellent craftsmanship of ancient Oriental and Central Asian textile dyers is already demonstrated in the remarkable brilliance and fastness of the colours of the so-called Pazyryk carpet, the by far oldest pile carpet found to date. This specimen resembles the advanced craftsmanship of Iron Age Central Asian textile production. We have employed synchrotron-based µ-XRF imaging to detect the distribution of metal organic pigments within individual fibres of the Pazyryk carpet (about 2500 years old) and compare the results to wool fibres, which we prepared according to traditional Anatolian dyeing recipes. We observe congruent pigment distribution within specimens from the Pazyryk carpet and natural wool fibres that we have fermented prior to dyeing. Therefore, we conclude that the superior fermentation technique has been utilized about 2000 years earlier than known so far.

scholarly journals Ancient genomic time transect from the Central Asian Steppe unravels the history of the Scythians

2021 ◽  
Vol 7 (13) ◽  
pp. eabe4414
Author(s):  
Guido Alberto Gnecchi-Ruscone ◽  
Elmira Khussainova ◽  
Nurzhibek Kahbatkyzy ◽  
Lyazzat Musralina ◽  
Maria A. Spyrou ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
Gene Pools ◽  
Social Rules ◽  
Eurasian Steppe ◽  
Central Asian ◽  
Genome Wide ◽  
Genome Wide Data ◽  
History Of ◽  
First Millennium

The Scythians were a multitude of horse-warrior nomad cultures dwelling in the Eurasian steppe during the first millennium BCE. Because of the lack of first-hand written records, little is known about the origins and relations among the different cultures. To address these questions, we produced genome-wide data for 111 ancient individuals retrieved from 39 archaeological sites from the first millennia BCE and CE across the Central Asian Steppe. We uncovered major admixture events in the Late Bronze Age forming the genetic substratum for two main Iron Age gene-pools emerging around the Altai and the Urals respectively. Their demise was mirrored by new genetic turnovers, linked to the spread of the eastern nomad empires in the first centuries CE. Compared to the high genetic heterogeneity of the past, the homogenization of the present-day Kazakhs gene pool is notable, likely a result of 400 years of strict exogamous social rules.

scholarly journals Wealth Inequality in the Ancient Near East: A Preliminary Assessment Using Gini Coefficients and Household Size

2020 ◽  
Vol 30 (4) ◽  
pp. 689-704
Author(s):  
Pertev Basri ◽  
Dan Lawrence
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
Near East ◽  
Social Systems ◽  
Wealth Inequality ◽  
Household Wealth ◽  
Household Size ◽  
Political Organization ◽  
Ancient Near East ◽  
Rural Sites

Investigating how different forms of inequality arose and were sustained through time is key to understanding the emergence of complex social systems. Due to its long-term perspective, archaeology has much to contribute to this discussion. However, comparing inequality in different societies through time, especially in prehistory, is difficult because comparable metrics of value are not available. Here we use a recently developed technique which assumes a correlation between household size and household wealth to investigate inequality in the ancient Near East. If this assumption is correct, our results show that inequality increased from the Neolithic to the Iron Age, and we link this increase to changing forms of social and political organization. We see a step change in levels of inequality around the time of the emergence of urban sites at the beginning of the Bronze Age. However, urban and rural sites were similarly unequal, suggesting that outside the elite, the inhabitants of each encompassed a similar range of wealth levels. The situation changes during the Iron Age, when inequality in urban environments increases and rural sites become more equal.

Cooperatives as a Buffer Between Capitalism’s Conflicting Classes: The Pioneering Case of the Portuguese Cooperative Societies Act

2020 ◽  
Vol 32 (4) ◽  
pp. 439-462
Author(s):  
ANDRÉS SPOGNARDI
Keyword(s):  
Policy Formulation ◽  
Ruling Class ◽  
Multiple Streams ◽  
Ruling Elite ◽  
Historical Method ◽  
Multiple Streams Approach ◽  
Cooperative Development ◽  
Class Cleavage ◽  
The Stability ◽  
The Impact

AbstractPortugal was a pioneer in state-led cooperative development. In 1867, the parliament passed legislation encouraging workers to organize their own collective businesses. In the view of the ruling elite, this would prevent the emergence of a class cleavage between labor and capital, contributing to the stability of the liberal economic and political order. Combining the historical method with John Kingdon’s multiple-streams approach to policy formulation, this article examines the complex array of domestic and external factors that shaped this policy intervention. Additionally, the study explores the impact of the policy on the involved stakeholders. Far from fulfilling the expectations of its promoters, the law on cooperatives seems to have only marginally stimulated the growth of the sector. Moreover, the government’s support to cooperatives seems to have undermined the legitimacy of the model in the eyes of a labor movement that was starting to see its interests as opposed to those of the ruling class.

An Unusual Fabric from Jety-Asar-2, Eastern Aral Sea Region, in the Context of the Central Asian Textile Tradition

2020 ◽  
Vol 48 (3) ◽  
pp. 50-58
Author(s):  
N. V. Polosmak ◽  
E. V. Karpova ◽  
E. V. Amosov
Keyword(s):  
Iron Age ◽  
Silk Road ◽  
Aral Sea ◽  
Early Iron Age ◽  
Wool Fabric ◽  
Technological Characteristics ◽  
Central Asian ◽  
Decorative Motifs ◽  
Interdisciplinary Study

We present the results of an interdisciplinary study of an unusual sample of wool fabric, found at the Jety-Asar-2 fortifi ed site, representing the Jety-Asar culture of the late 4th century BC to early 1st century AD, in the central Turan Plain. We outline the results of the analysis of the dyes and technological characteristics of the fabric. The woven pattern is described in detail. The specimen is compared with the tapestry from Shanpula (Sampul) cemetery in the Hotan oasis, Xinjiang, China. We examine the idea that the Jety-Asar fabric had been manufactured in Shanpula and transported to the Aral basin along the Great Silk Road. Previously, this type of tapestry was believed to have been used only in the Hotan oasis, because no direct parallels with other areas were known. A direct parallel with such a remote westerly region is all the more intriguing. Apparently, colorful strips of woolen tapestry depicting animals, birds, humans, fantastic beings, mountains, and fl owers were in big demand. The tradition, then, may have been distributed much more widely than previously thought. Many anthropomorphic, zoomorphic, plant, and purely decorative motifs have numerous parallels in the Early Iron Age art of the Eurasian steppes, highlands, and piedmont areas. The Shanpula people used such fabric for decorating skirts. In other cultures, it was destined for various purposes.

scholarly journals Crises of political development in Ukraine: causes and content

2021 ◽  
pp. 33-61
Author(s):  
Galyna Zelenko ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Social Stratification ◽  
Political Development ◽  
Well Being ◽  
The State ◽  
Political Life ◽  
Political Regime ◽  
Ruling Class ◽  
Negative Effects ◽  
Ruling Elite ◽  
Low Efficiency

Crises of political development are inherent in countries transitioning from an authoritarian to a democratic regime. In contrast to political crises, crises of political development are inherent in transit societies. Usually they have much deeper and more fundamental reasons related to the quality of the authoritarian political regime, the nature of the transformational changes and are much longer lasting. Іn this article author analyzes the crises of political development that are manifested in Ukraine during the transformation of the political regime. The crises of political development include the crisis of identity, distribution, participation, penetration and legitimacy. The crisis of identity characterizes the disintegration of ideals and values that dominated in political culture of the previous period; the crisis of distribution lies in the inability of the ruling elite to ensure socially acceptable growth of material well-being and its distribution, which causes social stratification and is a constant source of socio-political conflicts; the crisis of penetration is conditioned in the reduced ability of public authorities to perform the functions inherent in the state, which complicates the implementation of reforms and governance; the crisis of participation is conditioned through the creation of artificial barriers by the ruling class for the inclusion in political life of groups claiming power or passivity of society, as a result of which unconventional forms of political participation begin to prevail; the crisis of legitimacy is conditioned in the low efficiency of the constitutional model of power organization and arises as a result of inconsistency of goals and values of the ruling regime with the ideas of the majority of citizens about the rules of just government. The combination of these crises creates a crisis syndrome of modernization and hinders the development of the state in general. In conclusions the author formulates the institutional tools which can reduce the negative effects of crises of political development. Key words: crisis of political development, crisis of identity, crisis of distribution, crisis of participation, crisis of penetration, crisis of legitimacy, financial-industrial groups, political institutionalization, political regime.

The Kushan Empire

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Xinru Liu
Keyword(s):  
Roman Empire ◽  
Material Culture ◽  
Central Asia ◽  
Silk Road ◽  
Local Institutions ◽  
Large Area ◽  
Ruling Elite ◽  
Trade Networks ◽  
Central Asian ◽  
The Silk Road

The Kushan Empire was a political power that started as a nomadic tribe from the Central Asian steppe and became established as sedentary state across South Asia and Central Asia. Migrating from the border of agricultural China in late 2nd century bce to north Afghanistan, by the 1st century ce, the Yuezhi nomads transformed themselves into a ruling elite in a large area from Afghanistan to the Indus Valley and North Indian Plain, embracing many linguistic and ethnic groups. Adapting the Persian satrapy administrative system into Indian kshatrapa administration, the Kushan regime gave much autonomy to local institutions such as castes, guilds, and Buddhist monasteries and meanwhile won support from those local communities. Legacies from Achaemenid Persia and Hellenistic cities, the cultures of various nomadic groups from Central Asia, and Buddhist and Brahmanical traditions merged to create a cosmopolitan Kushan material culture and art. Mahāyāna Buddhist theology and institutions matured in the Kushan economic and cultural environment and were propagated to Central Asia and China from there. Having under their control several important commodities, such as silk, lapis lazuli, and horses, demanded by elites from the Roman Empire, the Han Empire, and the Parthian Empire, the Kushan court sat on a key location of the Eurasian trade networks, or the Silk Road. The Kushan Empire benefited from the Silk Road trade economically and meanwhile received knowledge of faraway countries and facilitated transferring the information to the visions of the Romans, Parthians, and Chinese.

scholarly journals The social networks and structural variation of Mississippian sociopolitics in the southeastern United States

2019 ◽  
Vol 116 (14) ◽  
pp. 6707-6712 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jacob Lulewicz
Keyword(s):  
Identity Politics ◽  
Political Organization ◽  
Small Scale ◽  
Ruling Class ◽  
Political Organizations ◽  
Sociopolitical Organization ◽  
Relational Structures ◽  
Network Analyses ◽  
Southern Appalachian ◽  
Political Landscapes

Network approaches in archaeology offer a promising avenue for facilitating bottom-up, comparative approaches to sociopolitical organization. While recent applications have focused primarily on migration and demographic trends, identity and identity politics, and the dynamics of geopolitical and regional interaction, little in the way of comparative sociopolitical organization has been attempted. In this study, I present an alternative approach to the use of sociotypological models across southern Appalachia. In particular, I demonstrate the value in employing network analyses as a mode of formally and quantitatively comparing the relational structures and organizations of sociopolitical landscapes; in this case, those traditionally characterized as constellations of chiefdoms. By approaching southern Appalachian histories through the relationships upon which social, political, and economic institutions were actually built, I move the study of southeastern political systems beyond the use of models that emphasize the behaviors of elites and the ruling class as inspired by the ethnographic and ethnohistoric records. To these ends, using a robust regional ceramic dataset, I compare network histories and political landscapes for the southern Appalachian region between ca. AD 800 and 1650. The results of these analyses contribute insights to the study of small-scale political organizations by demonstrating that (i) as chiefdoms developed, leaders drew on preexisting social and political conditions; (ii) while networks of chiefly interaction were defined by instability, wider networks of interaction were much more durable; and (iii) quantitative network analyses and qualitative ethnohistoric accounts can articulate with one another to shed light on indigenous political organization.

scholarly journals Formation of anti-corruption legal consciousness of state and municipal officials of Russia

2019 ◽  
Vol 70 ◽  
pp. 11005
Author(s):  
Svetlana Kuzina ◽  
Inga Sagiryan ◽  
Gleb Fomin
Keyword(s):  
Modern Society ◽  
The State ◽  
Legal Consciousness ◽  
State Control ◽  
Ruling Class ◽  
Ruling Elite ◽  
Russian State ◽  
Slow Moving ◽  
Control Of Corruption ◽  
Moving Process

The article is devoted to the state of public legal consciousness of society as a whole, and one of its strata – the governing elite, state and municipal officials, regarding issues related to corruption in Russia. On the way of movement of the Russian state to the civilized principles of construction of modern society there are a lot of difficulties, which should be overcome both by the state power, and the Russian citizens. Such problems are: stereotypical thinking, traditionally forming a neutral and tolerant attitude of Russians to the manifestations of corruption; lack of strict state control of corruption actions of the ruling elite; resistance of the ruling class to the spread of international requirements for the state to fight against corruption, and so on. Bringing Russian anti-corruption legislation into requirements of compliance with the rule of law is a slow-moving process, but the need to improve it has become an urgent need not only for the Russian Federation, but also for the Supreme power.

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