scholarly journals THE FLESH-HOOK FEATURING A SCENE OF FIST FIGHTING FROM A MAIKOP CULTURE DOLMEN NEAR THE VILLAGE OF TSARSKAYA IN THE NORTHWEST CAUCASUS

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
В.А. Трифонов ◽  
Н.И. Шишлина ◽  
А.Ю. Лобода ◽  
В.А. Хвостиков
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Comprehensive Analysis ◽  
Early Bronze Age ◽  
The Caucasus ◽  
Early Dynastic ◽  
Western Asia ◽  
The World ◽  
Temple Art ◽  
The Village ◽  
Portable Art

В статье приведены результаты всестороннего анализа уникального бронзового крюка с антропоморфными фигурками из дольмена эпохи ранней бронзы (прибл. 3200–2900 до н. э.) у ст. Царская (совр. Новосвободная) на Северо-Западном Кавказе. Установлено, что предмет отлит из мышьяковой бронзы по технологии утрачиваемой восковой модели, является крюком для вынимания мяса из котла и входит в набор церемониальной посуды для общественной трапезы. Изображения пары обнаженных мужчин, стоящих в боксерской стойке, представляют сцену ритуального поединка в присутствии или в честь божества, чьим атрибутом являются бычьи рога, на которых соперники стоят. Предмет в целом ассоциируется с темой погребального пира и погребальных игр. Вероятно, что сюжет и иконография изображений восходят к канонам храмового шумерского искусства раннединастического, а возможно, и более раннего времени. Адаптация этой темы в майкопской культурной среде объясняется ее принадлежностью к кругу культур самой северной периферии переднеазиатской цивилизации. Пара фигур, изображенная на крюке из Царской, является самым ранним образцом антропоморфной металлической мелкой пластики на Кавказе и, видимо, самым ранним в мире скульптурным изображением кулачного поединка. The paper reports on the results of comprehensive analysis of a unique bronze flesh-hook featuring anthropomorphic figures from an Early Bronze Age dolmen (ca. 3200–2900 BC) near the village of Tsarskaya (contemporary Novosvobodnaya) in the Northwest Caucasus (fig. 1). It was established that the flesh-hook was cast from arsenical bronze with the use of the lost wax method and was used to take meat out of a cauldron and, therefore, it entered a ceremonial table-ware set used in public feasts. The depicted pair of naked men in boxing stand (fig. 2; 3) represents a scene of ritual fight in the presence of or in honor of a deity whose attribute are bull horns (fig. 4), on which fighters are standing. As a whole, the item is associated with the theme of a funeral feast and funeral games. The narrative scene and iconography of the images are likely to have its roots in the canons of Sumerian temple art of the Early Dynastic period and, probably, even of the earlier time (fig. 5). The adaptation of this narrative to the Maikop cultural milieu is explained by its attribution to the circle of cultures located in the northernmost periphery of the Western Asia civilization. Two figures depicted on the Tsarskaya fleshhook represent the earliest example of anthropomorphic portable art in the Caucasus and the earliest sculptural image of fist fighting in the world.

scholarly journals BRONZE NOSE RINGS FROM THE BURIAL OF THE EARLY BRONZE AGE IN THE NORTH CAUCASUS

2021 ◽  
Vol 17 (2) ◽  
pp. 403-427
Author(s):  
Alla S. Denyaeva ◽  
Ilya A. Zaytsev ◽  
Leonid S. Iljukov
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Nasal Septum ◽  
Early Bronze Age ◽  
Burial Mound ◽  
Burial Ground ◽  
North Caucasus ◽  
The North ◽  
Small Series ◽  
The World ◽  
The Village

In 2017, in a single burial mound in the Novosrednenskoye-1 burial ground, located near the village of the same name in the Kirovsky district of the Stavropol Territory, a burial was examined on an ancient horizon, over which an earthen embankment was erected. The deceased was in a wooden box, on the ceiling of which were the skulls of two bulls with bronze nose rings. A small series of burial complexes found in burials on the territory of the North Caucasus, in which nose rings were found, are considered. They were used to control animals harnessed to a cart. A symbolic team of two bulls was used to travel the soul of the deceased into the world of their ancestors. In the Novosvobodnenskoe time, a fashion emerged for the use of wire oval pendants, which were fixed not in the puncture of the nasal septum, but in the punctures of the earlobes. Such pendants, made of bronze or silver wire, were popular in the Novotitarovskaya culture, which replaced the Novosvobodnaya culture.

scholarly journals Population structure of modern-day Italians reveals patterns of ancient and archaic ancestries in Southern Europe

2019 ◽  
Vol 5 (9) ◽  
pp. eaaw3492 ◽  
Author(s):  
A. Raveane ◽  
S. Aneli ◽  
F. Montinaro ◽  
G. Athanasiadis ◽  
S. Barlera ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Population Structure ◽  
Bronze Age ◽  
The Caucasus ◽  
Italian Peninsula ◽  
Nomadic Pastoralists ◽  
Genome Wide ◽  
A Genome ◽  
The World ◽  
European Populations

European populations display low genetic differentiation as the result of long-term blending of their ancient founding ancestries. However, it is unclear how the combination of ancient ancestries related to early foragers, Neolithic farmers, and Bronze Age nomadic pastoralists can explain the distribution of genetic variation across Europe. Populations in natural crossroads like the Italian peninsula are expected to recapitulate the continental diversity, but have been systematically understudied. Here, we characterize the ancestry profiles of Italian populations using a genome-wide dataset representative of modern and ancient samples from across Italy, Europe, and the rest of the world. Italian genomes capture several ancient signatures, including a non–steppe contribution derived ultimately from the Caucasus. Differences in ancestry composition, as the result of migration and admixture, have generated in Italy the largest degree of population structure detected so far in the continent, as well as shaping the amount of Neanderthal DNA in modern-day populations.

Archaeological investigations of the Early Bronze Age burial site QA1 at Wadi al-Fajj in northern Oman: Results of the 2016 season

2018 ◽  
Vol 26 (1) ◽  
pp. 521-539
Author(s):  
Łukasz Rutkowski
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Skeletal Remains ◽  
Early Bronze Age ◽  
Burial Site ◽  
Joint Project ◽  
Ground Plan ◽  
Pottery Sherds ◽  
The Village

The first excavation season of a joint project of the PCMA and Department of Archaeology and Excavations, Ministry of Heritage and Culture, Oman, was carried out in the microregion of Qumayrah in the fall of 2016. A single tomb was investigated at an Umm an-Nar period burial site in the area of the village of Al-Ayn. A complete ground-plan was traced, identifying the tomb as an example of a well-known type with interior divided into four burial chambers by crosswalls. The excavated quadrant yielded commingled skeletal remains and mortuary gifts: numerous beads, a number of pottery sherds and a single complete vessel, a few metal objects and a score of stone vessel fragments.

Sweeter than wine? The use of the grape in early western Asia

Antiquity ◽  
2008 ◽  
Vol 82 (318) ◽  
pp. 937-946 ◽  
Author(s):  
Naomi F. Miller
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Selective Breeding ◽  
Natural Habitat ◽  
White Wine ◽  
Early Bronze Age ◽  
Late Neolithic ◽  
Western Asia

AbstractEmotional news for lovers of a dry white wine. The blissful Hippocrene was composed from wild grapes from the sixth millennium BC in the lands of its natural habitat. But, as the author shows, the cultivation, domestication and selective breeding of the grape following in the Late Neolithic to Early Bronze Age was aimed primarily at the enjoyment of its sweetness.

scholarly journals Golden hoard from Bushtino (Ukraine)

2020 ◽  
Vol 24 ◽  
pp. 331-344
Author(s):  
Josip Kobal’
Keyword(s):  
Key Words ◽  
Bronze Age ◽  
Organic Materials ◽  
Western Asia ◽  
Ethnographic Data ◽  
The Village ◽  
The Bronze Age

The territory of the modern Transcarpathian region of Ukraine is rich in Bronze Age hoards (about 200 complexes are known). However, just a small part of them includes only gold objects. The gold items of the treasure were interpreted as Tarpa type earrings and dated to the Opaya horizon (BD). Re-analysis of the finding allowed reviewing the data of the statement. The article proposes to refer the complex to the period of the BC and, perhaps, even BB1, and to interpret gold implements as elements of a special hairstyle or headdress (crown?). The hoard from the village of Bushtino (Khust district), which is the focus of our article, also belongs to them. The hoard was discovered in 1911. It consisted of 13 jewellery items (11 gold pendants and 2 bracelets). To date, only 3 items have been saved. They are stored in Uzhgorod, in the Transcarpathian Museum of Local Lore named after Tyvodar Lehotsky. Jewellery items from Bushtino belong to two types: Tarpa type of earrings (1) and Bushtino type of pendants (2). All of them are ornamented in one technique and in one style, and also have common or close motives (paired zigzag lines, crosses, stars, etc. and their combinations) and compositions. The analysis of ornamental motifs of ornaments from Bushtino shows that most of them have analogies on products of earlier times, periods BB1 - BA2. Tarpa-type bronze earrings in the Pilin culture (Northern Hungary and Eastern Slovakia) mostly also date to an earlier time (BC period). The author of the article proposes to determine the chronology of the Bushtino hoard not later than the period of BC or even BB1. Based on archaeological and ethnographic data, as well as the number of ornaments in individual complexes, it is hypothesized that gold items from Bushtino could be either part of a special hairstyle (women?), or part of a special headdress (crown?) made of organic materials (fabric, leather). Rich headdresses (crowns) existed in the Bronze Age in Western Asia and Europe. Probably the implements from Bushtino belonged to someone from the elite unit of cultural bearers of Suciu de Sus (Stanovo). Key words: Superior Tisa Region, Bronze Age, gold hoard, chronology, interpretation.

scholarly journals THE EARLY BRONZE AGE SETTLEMENT AND THE GRAVE NEAR THE VILLAGE OF STAROTITAROVSKAYA, THE KRASNODAR REGION AND BURIAL DISCOVERED AT THE SITE

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
С.Н. Кореневский ◽  
Ш.О. Давудов
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Young Woman ◽  
Local Population ◽  
Mineral Admixture ◽  
Early Bronze Age ◽  
Flat Bottom ◽  
Mineral Inclusions ◽  
Krasnodar Region ◽  
Funerary Rites ◽  
The Village

В статье представлена публикация новых находок эпохи раннего бронзового века на поселении у станицы Старотитаровской Краснодарского края. Культурный слой поселения плохо выражен и нарушен поселением античного времени. К эпохе раннего бронзового века относится обломок каменного топора, кремневая пластина, несколько сосудов с формовочной массой без минеральных примесей и с минеральными примесями. Судя по ним, поселение датируется концом IV тыс. до н. э. Среди форм керамики присутствуют сосуды с круглым и плоским дном. В яме 58 Б расчищены 4 скелета людей: трех мужчин и юной женщины. Эти находки ставят вопрос об особых формах погребальной обрядности у местного населения и их соотнесения с погребальными традициями майкопской культуры. The paper publishes new Early Bronze Age finds excavated at the settlement near the village of Starotitarovskaya in the Krasnodar region. The cultural attribution of the occupation layer of the settlement is not easily identifiable it was strongly disturbed by a settlement dating to the Classical period. A fragment of a stone shaft hole axe, a retouched flint blade and several vessels made from clay tempered with mineral admixture and clay tempered without mineral inclusions were dated to the Early Bronze Age. Based on these finds, the settlement was attributed to the end of the 4th mill. BC. Pottery finds include several vessels with a round and flat bottom. Four skeletons were discovered in pit 58 B: skeletons of three males and a skeleton of one young woman. These finds raise an issue of special forms of funerary rites practiced by the local population and their correlation with funerary traditions of the Majkop culture.

scholarly journals Archeolinguistics

enadakultura ◽  
2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tamar Makharoblidze
Keyword(s):  
Interdisciplinary Studies ◽  
Cultural Backgrounds ◽  
The Caucasus ◽  
Comparative Linguistics ◽  
Cultural Traditions ◽  
The World ◽  
Historical Comparative ◽  
High Level ◽  
The Village ◽  
And Linguistics

Archeolinguistcs is a field of linguistic studies, which creates an ancient picture of the world. For instance: let’s talk about the ancient cultures such as Kura–Araxes (Kur–Araz). Archeological excavations in Georgia with the amazing findings of Kura–Araxes (Kur–Araz) Culture, that existed from about 4000 BC until about 2000 BC, and Shulaveri-Shomu Tepe Culture which preceded the Kura–Araxes Culture in this region or Colchian Culture 3000 BCE to 600 BCE, Trialeti Culture late 3rd and early 2nd millennium BC, Bedeni-Martkopi or Early Kurgan Culture before 2550 BC, and many others. The excavations showed that Kura–Araxes Culture and Shulaveri-Shomu Tepe Culture are remarkably wealthy. The economy was based on farming and livestock-raising (especially of cattle and sheep). They grew grain and orchard crops, and are known to have used implements to make flour. They raised cattle, sheep, goats, dogs, and in later phases, horses. They worked with copper, arsenic, silver, gold, tin, and bronze. These archeological cultures how a precocious metallurgical development, which strongly influenced surrounding regions. Viticulture and wine-making were widely practiced in this area from the earliest times. The word ‘vine’ in many languages worldwide comes from Georgian (‘ghvino’). The earliest evidence of domesticated grapes in the world has been found at Gadachrili Gora, near the village of Imiri, southeastern of Georgia; carbon-dating points to the date of about 6000 BC. Grape pips dating back to the V-IVth millennia B.C. were found in Shulaveri; others dating back to the IVth millennium B.C. were found in 'Shulaveri area' in Georgia. Kura-Araxes and Shulaveri-Shomu cultures developed gradually through a synthesis of several cultural traditions, including the ancient cultures of the Caucasus and nearby territories.Following the archeological vectors we can research the linguistic lexical bases of the transported things and/or customs and traditions, following the archeological path and revealing the historical faces for the worlds reconstructing them with the well-known methods of historical-comparative linguistics, and creating the archeolinguistic dictionaries. Of course the historical linguistics has already used its methods to reconstruct the words, but archeolinguistics will systemically follow the vectors viewing the wide lexicosemantic and cultural backgrounds, considering the artifacts as the units of the entire system. On the other hand, archeologists give the names to the things they find, but they never get any linguistic consultations or advices. ‘A cult item’ usually is named a thing with unknown functions - by the archeologists. The archeological vectors had been spread from this region to the south, west and north, transporting the cultural and household appliances. The migrated things had their names and functions. Of course the names migrated with these things as well. These migrated things have been adopted functionally and linguistically for the each case at the each location. The proposed theory states that linguistic vectors followed archeological ones. The challenge is to study these combined vectors, and the field can be called as ‘Archeological linguistics’ or ‘Archeolinguistcs’. Archeological linguistics will study the ancient linguistic picture of the world. Actually this will be the interdisciplinary studies, which will request the high level professionals in history-archeology and linguistics. The ancient word-roots can be revealed and the full lingvoculutral portrait can be restored for the each region around the globe.

The Ezero Mound in South-East Bulgaria

Antiquity ◽  
1966 ◽  
Vol 40 (157) ◽  
pp. 33-37 ◽  
Author(s):  
G. I. Georgiev ◽  
N. J. Merpert
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Eastern Mediterranean ◽  
Open Water ◽  
Early Bronze Age ◽  
Important Data ◽  
Settlement Site ◽  
South Eastern Europe ◽  
A Site ◽  
The Village ◽  
The Bronze Age

Very little work has so far been done on the Bronze Age in South-East Bulgaria. This is an area which is of the greatest importance in the prehistory of South-Eastern Europe, a fact which has been often stressed by archaeologists working in the Eastern Mediterranean [I]. Geographically linked closely to Asia Minor and the Mediterranean lands, and especially to the Troad, South-East Bulgaria should provide important data for the establishment of relations between these lands in the Bronze Age. With these aims in mind the village settlement of Ezero, a site which even before excavation was obviously one of many periods, presented itself clearly as a place for excavation. Ezero, also known as Dipsis, is 3 km. south-east of Nova Zagora: it is not far from the well-known settlement site of Karanovo and 24 km. from the Azmak mound described in a recent number of this journal [2]. Preliminary excavations carried out from 1952-8 at Ezero showed that the settlement had a great thickness of occupation levels dating from the Early Bronze Age. Systematic excavation was restarted in 1961 and continued in 1963 and 1964.The site is bordered by swampy ground and large open water-meadows. The damp, easily worked soil was well suited to primitive agriculture, and the meadows to stock-rearing.

Archaeological Investigation of the “Lozianska Mogila” Barrow located near the Village of Boyanovo, Municipality of Elkhovo, in South-eastern Bulgaria

2015 ◽  
Vol 90 (1-2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Daniela Agre
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
Early Bronze Age ◽  
Stratigraphic Sequence ◽  
Archaeological Investigation ◽  
Relative Chronology ◽  
Middle Bronze Age ◽  
Burial Rites ◽  
Bronze Ancien ◽  
The Village

Es werden die Ergebnisse der Ausgrabung an einem Grabhügel „Lozianska Mogila” in den Jahren 2007 und 2009 vorgestellt. Insgesamt 21 Gräber wurden darin entdeckt, die sich auf drei stratigraphische Schichten verteilten. Der erste Hügel barg zehn Bestattungen, die in die frühe Bronzezeit datieren. Vier Gräber wurden während der mittleren Bronzezeit in diesen Hügel eingelassen. Über sie wurde eine weitere, die zweite Aufschüttung errichtet. In sie wurden die weiteren sechs mittelbronzezeitlichen Gräber eingetieft. Eine längere Zeit wurde der Grabhügel danach nicht mehr belegt. Erst in der Eisenzeit wurde ein weiteres Grab errichtet, das mit einer dritten und letzten Aufschüttung überdeckt wurde. Jede Bestattung wird innerhalb eines Kataloges in dem Artikel beschrieben.Die Kennzeichen der Bestattungssitten und der Grabkonstruktionen werden zusammen mit den Beigaben getrennt für die frühe und die mittlere Bronzezeit besprochen. Von besonderem Interesse ist dieCet article présente les résultats de fouilles entreprises en 2007 et 2009 dans le tumulus de « Lozianska Mogila » sur le territoire de la Bulgarie moderne. Vingt-etune sépultures et trois niveaux stratigraphiques ont été découverts. Le tumulus le plus ancien contenait dix sépultures du Bronze Ancien. Quatre sépultures du Bronze Moyen ont été insérées dans ce tumulus. Un second niveau a recouvert ces quatre sépultures et six autres sépultures du Bronze Moyen ont taillé ce niveau. Une sépulture datant de l’âge du Fer fut ajoutée après une longue période d’abandon et ensuite recouverte d’une troisième et dernière couche de terre. Chaque ensemble funéraire fait l’objet d’une description détaillée et les aspects caractéristiques des sépultures du Bronze Ancien et Moyen, leur construction, les rites funéraires ainsi que l’inventaire du mobilier sont présentés. Une datation radiocarbone obtenue pour la tombe no. 14 est d’intérêt particulier : une date de 2888–2676 cal BC nous permet de l’attribuer à la phase Bronze Ancien II (en termes de chronologie relative bulgare). Nous accordons aussi une attention particulière à la dernière sépulture du tumulus, datée de la première moitié du IVe siècle av. J.-C. sur la base de trouvailles semblables en Bulgarie méridionale.The results of excavations in 2007 and 2009 of the “Lozianska Mogila” barrow in present-day Bulgaria are presented here. Twenty-one graves were discovered in the barrow and a stratigraphic sequence of three layers was observed. The earliest barrow contained ten graves dated to the Early Bronze Age. Four burials of the Middle Bronze Age were dug into this early tumulus. A second layer was then heaped on these four graves and six other graves dating to the Middle Bronze Age were cut into it. After a longer period of disuse another grave was built in the Iron Age and then covered by the third and last layer. The article contains a detailed description of each grave complex. Characteristic aspects of the burial rites and grave construction as well as the inventory of the Early and Middle Bronze Age complexes are discussed in turn. The radiocarbon date obtained for grave no. 14, with a time span of 2888–2676 cal BC is of particular interest and corresponds to its archaeological attribution to the Early Bronze Age II (in terms of Bulgarian relative chronology). Special attention is also given to the latest grave in the barrow, which parallels in southern Bulgaria would date to the first half of the 4

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