Central Asia and the Interaction between the Iranian Plateau and the Steppes in Late First Millennium BC

2018 ◽  
Vol 24 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 331-353
Author(s):  
Johanna Lhuillier ◽  
Julio Bendezu-Sarmiento
Keyword(s):  
Central Asia ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
Aral Sea ◽  
Cultural Groups ◽  
Late Neolithic ◽  
Stratigraphic Sequence ◽  
Iranian Plateau ◽  
Southern Central ◽  
First Millennium ◽  
Middle Iron Age

AbstractResearch led by the joint French-Turkmen Archaeological Expedition (MAFTur) at Ulug-depe have brought to light the longest continuous stratigraphic sequence of southern Central Asia, starting from the Late Neolithic up to the Middle Iron Age. During the last fieldwork seasons, a later, still poorly-known occupation has been identified: after its abandonment at the end of the Middle Iron Age period, Ulug-depe was briefly reoccupied during the late 1st millennium BC. The archaeological levels related to this occupation are extremely poorly preserved, and this stage is mainly witnessed by a particular pottery complex. Preliminary and ongoing researches on this pottery complex suggest that it principally includes Hellenistic-period vessels associated with some more unusual shapes. This association of material finds analogies in the area of interaction between the northern and the southern parts of Central Asia (i.e., in Uzbekistan, in a territory stretching from Tashkent to the Aral Sea through the Syr Darya area). In this paper, we will present a first overview of these discoveries, placing Ulug-depe at the crossroads of different cultural groups, sedentary and possibly nomadic, at the end of the 1st millennium BC.

The Bear in the Grave: Exploitation of Top Predator and Herbivore Resources in First Millennium Sweden—First Trends from a Long-Term Research Project

2016 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
pp. 3-27 ◽  
Author(s):  
Karl-Johan Lindholm ◽  
John Ljungkvist
Keyword(s):  
Iron Age ◽  
Main Question ◽  
Animal Products ◽  
Interregional Trade ◽  
Animal Populations ◽  
Animal Remains ◽  
First Millennium ◽  
Chronological Sequence ◽  
Middle Iron Age ◽  
Faunal Exploitation

This paper focusses on animal remains associated with archaeological contexts dated to the middle and later phases of the Scandinavian Iron Age, which corresponds to the first millennium AD. The main question to be addressed is whether this record can be used for identifying human impact on certain animal populations for modelling faunal exploitation and interregional trade. In the first part of the paper, we undertake a detailed inventory of animal finds recorded in published excavation reports, research catalogues, and in existing databases maintained primarily by the Historical Museum in Stockholm. We compare the chronological pattern identified in the burial assemblages with a chronological sequence retrieved from pitfall hunting systems located in the Scandinavian inland region. The chronologies of the animal finds from burials and the pitfall systems are then compared with dated pollen-analytical sequences retrieved in the inland region and additional archaeological assemblages, such as graves and hoards of Roman coins. In our discussion, we outline an interregional model of faunal exploitation between AD 300 and 1200, including the possible location of hunting grounds and end-distribution areas for animal products. The paper provides deeper insights into the burial record of the middle Iron Age, arguing for the need for broader interregional approaches, and focussed archaeological research in the inland regions of Scandinavia.

scholarly journals Fossilized fashion and social sparkle. Dutch Bronze Age bracelets in context

2021 ◽  
pp. 43-110
Author(s):  
S. Arnoldussen ◽  
H. Steegstra
Keyword(s):  
The Netherlands ◽  
Bronze Age ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
Late Neolithic ◽  
Contact Networks ◽  
Middle Iron Age

This contribution deals with the bronze bracelets found in the Netherlands that are datable between the Late Neolithic and the Middle Iron Age (n=176). We study their context (hoards, funerary contexts, settlements and stray finds), and we relate the specifics of their form and decoration to regional and supraregional traditions. First, we study their role as social signifiers (in reconstructions) of prehistoric identities across those scales, discussing how particular Bronze Age ‘costumes’ or ‘ornament sets’ may have been kept from graves and deposited in alternate ways. Then, we study later prehistoric arm-rings for their potential to indicate the scale, orientation and longevity of supraregional contact networks into which the later prehistoric communities of the Netherlands were integrated.

scholarly journals OBJECTS OF ANCIENT ART IN CENTRAL ASIA: THE SEARCH FOR THE ORIGIN OF ELEMENTS OF THE EARLY ANIMAL STYLE (the work of the Tuva expedition of the IA RAS)

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
И.В. Рукавишникова
Keyword(s):  
Central Asia ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
Aerial Photography ◽  
Early Iron Age ◽  
Single Group ◽  
Wooden Structure ◽  
First Millennium ◽  
Burial Mounds ◽  
First Millennium Bc ◽  
Wooden Structures

В статье обобщаются результаты исследований курганов раннего железного века в Туве с применением аэрофотосъемки для поиска курганов начала I тыс. до н. э., близких по конструкции кургану Аржан-1. Был выявлен курган Аржан-5, находящийся вблизи кургана Аржан-1. Курганная каменная насыпь сильно повреждена, но сохранилась каменно-деревянная конструкция, как и в Аржане-1, и предметы упряжи в зверином стиле. После проведения анализа проб деревянных конструкций, состава бронз и антропологических определений удалось сделать вывод, что Аржан-5 принадлежит к кругу Аржана-1, формирует с ним единую группу курганов и связан общей историей. Выделяется хронологический горизонт археологической культуры Аржана-1, когда уже создаются шедевры древнего искусства архаичного звериного стиля. The paper summarizes the results of the study of the Early Iron Age burial mounds in Tuva using aerial photography for searching constructions from the beginning of the first millennium BC, which are similar in design to the Arzhan-1 mound. The Arzhan-5 mound was revealed, located near the Arzhan-1. It was badly damaged, but the stone-wooden structure has survived and the harness in the animal style was preserved, just like in Arzhan-1. Due to analysis of the samples from wooden structures, of the composition of bronzes and to the anthropological identification, it become possible to conclude that Arzhan-5 belongs to the Arzhan-1 circle they form a single group of mounds and have a common history. The chronological horizon of the archaeological culture of Arzhan-1 is highlighted, when masterpieces of the ancient art of the archaic animal style are already being created.

Back to the Iron Age Chronology in Southern Central Asia

2021 ◽  
Vol 27 (2) ◽  
pp. 337-377
Author(s):  
Bertille Lyonnet ◽  
Michel Fontugne
Keyword(s):  
Central Asia ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
The Other ◽  
Hellenistic Period ◽  
Southern Central

Abstract The article reconsiders two major sites of the 1st millennium BC in southern Uzbekistan, Kyzyltepa and Kurganzol. It contests their recent dating – exclusively the Achaemenid and transitional Hellenistic period for the first one, and the end of the 4th c. BC for the second one – mainly based upon dendrochronological analyses relating the samples to the time of Alexander the Great’s conquest or slightly before, and ruling out the other dates given to these sites in previous publications. Our argumentation is based upon (1) various archaeological arguments and (2) scientific criteria that question the dendrochronological data and the supposed aging of the 14C results due to “old waters” from glaciers.

Objects, Place and People: Community Organization in Southern Britain in the First Millennium bc

2018 ◽  
Vol 28 (2) ◽  
pp. 321-344 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alex Davies
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
Community Organization ◽  
Holistic Approach ◽  
Minor Role ◽  
Late Bronze Age ◽  
Social Differences ◽  
First Millennium ◽  
Middle Iron Age ◽  
A Minor

This paper seeks to understand how identity was constructed and communities were constituted in the Late Bronze Age and Iron Age of parts of central and southern Britain. A holistic approach is favoured, finding patterns within each period that cross different types of evidence. These patterns can be related to underlying social and conceptual logic systems. It is argued that in the Late Bronze Age communities were relatively fluid and lineage played only a minor role in defining identity. Early Iron Age society was more concerned with ancestral genealogy and inter-generational inheritance. By the Middle Iron Age, this developed to the stage where smaller groups displayed increasing autonomy from each other. These social differences can account for many of the dissimilarities in the archaeological records of the Late Bronze Age and Iron Age. Despite contrasting methods of community organization, assessing contiguous periods under the same theoretical and methodological frameworks has proved a useful analytical device.

Excavations at a Neolithic Causewayed Enclosure, Orsett, Essex, 1975

1978 ◽  
Vol 44 ◽  
pp. 219-308 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Hedges ◽  
David Buckley ◽  
C. Bonsall ◽  
I. A. Kinnes ◽  
J. C. Barrett ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
The State ◽  
Early Bronze Age ◽  
Early Iron Age ◽  
Late Neolithic ◽  
Rectangular Enclosure ◽  
Middle Iron Age ◽  
Post Hole ◽  
Hole Structure

SummaryThe Causewayed Enclosure at Orsett, Essex, was trial trenched in 1975 to determine the state of site preservation and confirm its postulated Neolithic date and site sequence. The enclosure consisted of three incomplete circuits of discontinuous ditch with an associated timber palisade slot lying inside and concentric to the middle ditch. Within the interior was an oval post hole structure of a contemporary date. Quantities of Mildenhall style pottery and flint artifacts of the mid third millennium b.c. were recovered from the primary ditch silts and other features. A small quantity of Late Neolithic/Early Bronze Age wares came from the secondary ditch silts and the interior.Later phases on the site were represented by unenclosed Early Iron Age occupation, a Middle Iron Age sub-rectangular enclosure and Saxon ring-ditch burials.

scholarly journals Chronology and Possible Links Between Climatic and Cultural Change During the First Millennium Bc in Southern Siberia and Central Asia

Radiocarbon ◽  
2004 ◽  
Vol 46 (1) ◽  
pp. 259-276 ◽  
Author(s):  
G I Zaitseva ◽  
B van Geel ◽  
N A Bokovenko ◽  
K V Chugunov ◽  
V A Dergachev ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Central Asia ◽  
Bronze Age ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
Cultural Change ◽  
Sediment Cores ◽  
Steppe Zone ◽  
Southern Siberia ◽  
Eurasian Steppe ◽  
First Millennium ◽  
Geochemical Analyses

We reconstructed climate change during the second half of the Holocene for the Minusinsk (southern Siberia) and the Uyuk (Central Asia) valleys in the Eurasian steppe zone. Sediment cores from 2 lakes and a soil profile from the Arzhan-2 burial mount were investigated. We combined pollen and geochemical analyses and radiocarbon dating with the archaeological record. A sharp increase of human population density occurred at the transition from the Bronze Age to Iron Age (about 2700 cal BP). The most representative Scythian culture started in the Uyuk and the Minusinsk valleys after increased humidity and occupation capacity of the steppe zone during the 9th century BC.

The Citadel of Ulug Depe and the Iron Age Archaeological Sequence in Southern Central Asia

2005 ◽  
Vol 40 (0) ◽  
pp. 479-514 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rémy BOUCHARLAT ◽  
Henri-Paul FRANCFORT ◽  
Olivier LECOMTE
Keyword(s):  
Central Asia ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
Southern Central

scholarly journals Genetic continuity of Indo-Iranian speakers since the Iron Age in southern Central Asia.

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Perle C. P. Guarino-Vignon ◽  
Nina Marchi ◽  
Julio Bendezu-Sarmiento ◽  
Evelyne Heyer ◽  
Celine Bon
Keyword(s):  
Central Asia ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
Asian Population ◽  
Partial Replacement ◽  
South Asian Population ◽  
South Central ◽  
Genome Wide Data ◽  
Southern Central ◽  
Genetic Continuity ◽  
Linguistic Groups

Since prehistoric times, South Central Asia has been at the crossroads of the movement of people, culture, and goods. Today, the Central Asia's populations are divided into two cultural and linguistic groups: the Indo-Iranian and the Turko-Mongolian groups. Previous genetic studies unveiled that migrations from East Asia contributed to the spread of Turko-Mongolian populations in Central Asia and the partial replacement of the Indo-Iranian population. However, little is known about the origin of the latter. To shed light on this, we compare the genetic data on two current-day populations - Yaghnobis and Tajiks - with genome-wide data from published ancient individuals. The present Indo-Iranian populations from Central Asia display a strong genetic continuity with Iron Age samples from Turkmenistan and Tajikistan. We model Yaghnobis as a mixture of 93% Iron Age individual from Turkmenistan and 7% from Baikal. For the Tajiks, we observe a higher Baikal ancestry and an additional admixture event with a South Asian population. Our results, therefore, suggest that in addition to a complex history, Central Asia shows a remarkable genetic continuity since the Iron Age, with only limited gene flow.

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