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The Deer Goddess of Ancient Siberia: A Study in the Ecology of Belief
... 16 That transformation suggests that the small wooden animals depicted were also transformed from equine to cervid, although Kubarev's choice of the word "horn" implies transformation from equine to Capra, both of which are implied by the archaeological evidence. 17 According to Esther Jacobson, these smaller examples would be meant to capture a conversion or a metamorphic process (Jacobson 1993: Jacobson 2015). In the cases at Yustyd, Ulandryk (Kubarev 1987, pp. ...
... 89-120;131-132;137;Bunker et al. 1970, pp. 61-63;Jacobson 1993Jacobson , 2015Stümpel 2021; Andreeva 2021, among many others). For example, Jettmar argued that burial displays such as vessels, scoops, knives, and vases and including the remains of food found at Pazyryk Kurgan 2 suggested that feasting was part of the religious celebration (Jettmar 1967, p. 95). ...
... There is a vast bibliography in many languages on the "symbolic meaning" of animal imagery in Pazyrykian and Siberian societies in antiquity. For a summary of that bibliography see: Petya Andreeva 2021;Jacobson 1993Jacobson , 2015Polosmak 2001Gheorghiu et al. 2017 3. ...
Among the burials of horse herders who lived in the 4th–3rd centuries BCE Altai Mountains of South Siberia were some that contained small wooden figures of four-legged hoofed animals that represent horses, deer, or hybrid creatures. They decorated headgear buried with select commoners of the Pazyryk Culture. Although the people, material possessions, and horses of the elites were frequently ornamented with imagery often associated with the so-called Scytho-Siberian animal style, these figurines are generally more realistic and less stylized representations of natural creatures, either cervids or horses. There is, however, ambiguity in these representations; in some cases, figures that are horses have inset recesses on the tops of their heads, in addition to holes for ear inserts. This recalls the elaborate headdresses on some horses outfitted with large displays of antlers or horns made of wood, leather, and felt buried with the Pazyryk leaders. The implication of this ambiguity is explored here. Horses were “cultural capital and tokens of clout” (see Andreeva Introduction, this volume) in the Pazyryk Culture, as well as the base of the economy. Deer were foundational to older belief systems in Siberia. The commingling of horse, mountain goat/ibex, and deer features in Pazyryk Culture imagery has inspired this study.
... As with other animal imagery, deer, or cervids more generally, come in all sizes and shapes. Especially prominent and powerful during pre-Bronze eras, during the Bronze Age the deer appears to take on an even greater mantle as a kind of mythological or cult religious figure (Jacobson 1993). Increasingly stylized and enlarged, so-called Mongolian deer and other similarly stylized variations based on the Asian red deer, or maral (Cervus elaphus) are commonly depicted surrounded by dozens of other much smaller, subordinated, figures. ...
... Nevertheless, stylistic analysis of decorated artifacts retrieved from excavated sites (including, e.g., designs on fabrics, ornaments, pottery, and headgear) can narrow the range of possibilities. The utility of this approach is well demonstrated (Jacobson 1993;Frohlich 2003;Kubarev 2007;Parzinger et al. 2009). ...
... The evolving picture from Alataian rock art sites must also clarify still-cloudy developments in realms that are arguably religious and/or cosmological in characterconcerning ideas, attitudes, and practices situated within what Jacobson (1993) has called "the ecology of belief". These include matters of deification, spirit and/or nature worship, appeasement, protection, supplication, devotional offerings, purification, dream and vision quests, treatment of the dead, etc. ...
Altaian rock art is increasingly seen as essential to our grasp of the character and movements of ancient cultures throughout Inner Asia. Rock art imagery often provides our only pictorial information about a preliterate society. But while surface study by itself yields valuable information, joining the examination of rock art with dirt archaeology, geology, and paleoecology provides greater opportunities for advances in our understanding of key developments in the region’s dynamic prehistory: horse domestication and associated technologies, the birth of mobile pastoralism, the incursion of charioteers, the making and spread of deer stones, and the advent of metallurgy, to name but a few. This paper focuses on the Biluut Petroglyph Complex, a prehistoric ceremonial center at Khoton Lake in far-western Mongolia’s High Altai, which contains an array of archaeological sites associated with an unusually dense concentration of petroglyphs spanning the past 8–10,000 years. In presenting results of recent research carried out by his team at Khoton Lake, the author demonstrates the value of integrating rock art studies with other disciplines. The investigation of ritual landscape is crucial. Together with their pictorial details, the chronological distribution and spatial organization of petroglyph figure-types and stone monuments yield important clues concerning the lifeways of ancient peoples and the transmission of arts, ideas, and technologies throughout this culturally formative mountain zone. The focus and approach can serve as models globally.
... Meanwhile, graves in the nearby cemetery of Ludas-Varjú-dűlő were furnished with cuts of pork (Méniel 2006) characteristic of Celtic burials, including those of the La Tène culture in Hungary. Presuming that mortuary rituals are governed by stricter rules than mundane diet, this evidence would link the worked red deer skull fragment to the Celtic cultural side, although stags also frequently occur in Scythian rituals and art (Jacobson 1993). In addition, Scythian iconographic tradition often reflects Hellenistic stylistic influences, thereby contributing to the complexity of the problem in the geographical region where Celtic and Scythian traditions seem to overlap. ...
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... They were usually used as hanging decorations on horse saddles (Simpson -Pankova 2017, 244). 33 Esther Jacobson (1993) argues, drawing on the iconography and composition of the horse decorations and the funerary customs of the burials in the Eurasian steppe, that decorative horse trappings for Eurasian peoples carry important religious meanings. Therefore, the fish, which takes an important place in the repertoire of horse trappings, must also be religiously significant (Wu 2005, 264). ...
The sacred landscape of Central Asia consisted of various religions and ritual practices that grew out of local traditions. The latest archaeological excavations of the Iron Age cultic structures in Central Asia reveal a diverse array of ritual and religious practices during the Achaemenid period. Textual and artefactual evidence confirms the coexistence of various belief systems in Bactria and Sogdia, with the Achaemenid form of Zoroastrianism (or Mazdeism) among the practiced religions. The deity of the Amu Darya/Oxus River held widespread reverence. The Achaemenid dominion over Central Asia left a lasting impact on the region's sacred landscape, achieved not through direct imperial interference but through providing material support to the local religious institutions. Many traditions observed during the Achaemenid period endured over time, remaining fully operational throughout the subsequent Hellenistic era.
... Not all the history of Altai is connected with Turkic peoples, either. A crucial "moment" in this regard was the epoch of the so-called Early Nomads of the first millennium BC when a spectacular culture of the first sensu stricto nomads (horse riders) was formed in the Altai as well as in the surrounding regions of the Great Steppe (Jacobson 1993). Due to numerous cultural similarities between those Asian nomads and the Black Sea Scythians and the Sakas of Central Asia, who are believed to be Iranian-speaking people (Mallory 1989), the identification of these Altai Early Nomads as speakers of an Indo-European language cannot be excluded, and they have often been presented as such (e.g., Maloletko 2012, 227). ...
https://www.tandfonline.com/eprint/C3KJZ9MVQKCM9GQIIID2/full?target=10.1080/2159032X.2023.2299651
... L'intrico del palco cervino evoca i raggi del sole, o il suo andamento dendriforme può ricondursi all'idea dell'eterno ringiovamento e rinnovamento ciclico della natura, come accade presso i popoli dell'Eurasia (Jacobson, 1993). Si ricorda come la stessa accezione di «essere luminoso, brillante» caratterizza la radice proto-indoeuropea *bher-, riscontrabile, ad esempio, nel greco bronté («fulmine») quindi nel messapico Bréntion («testa di cervo»), toponimo latinizzato in Brundisium (Pokorny, 1959). ...
... L'intrico del palco cervino evoca i raggi del sole, o il suo andamento dendriforme può ricondursi all'idea dell'eterno ringiovamento e rinnovamento ciclico della natura, come accade presso i popoli dell'Eurasia (Jacobson, 1993). Si ricorda come la stessa accezione di «essere luminoso, brillante» caratterizza la radice proto-indoeuropea *bher-, riscontrabile, ad esempio, nel greco bronté («fulmine») quindi nel messapico Bréntion («testa di cervo»), toponimo latinizzato in Brundisium (Pokorny, 1959). ...
The article considers the consistency and distribution of the figures of cervids in Valcamonica rock art, through the systematic analysis of their presence/absence in the Palaeolithic, Chalcolithic, and Iron Age engravings. The attention for these animals unites, since the Palaeolithic, the iconography of geographically distant cultural facies. The primordial and constant presence of this family of mammals in the Alpine and Pre-Alpine territory, in particular, favours the observation of specific attributes of the animal, selected and reworked in the pre- and proto-historical imagery and culture, and potentially «veiled» by the mantle of symbolic superstructures. In Valcamonica,Pleistocene engravings of cervids relate dynamically to the surrounding post-glacial environment. In the Chalcolithic, they dominate the zoomorphic apparatus of the male statue-stelae, the monoliths-totem of the clans. The proto-historical world, on the other hand, sees them as protagonists of the initiation rituals of young warriors. Through different historical-cultural phases, semantic correspondences seem to persist between deer and the concepts of light/fire, remarked by the comparison with the recent tradition of the valley. Further considerations highlight the role of cervids/deer as animals markedly liminal that is, ideally framed in multiple spatial and «metaphysical» dimensions.
... Esta asignación la hacen los investigadores modernos. Es más, en todas las culturas humanas, en todos los continentes aparecen figuras humanas con cuernos de animal, tanto en Australia 12 como África 13 , y no sólo de ciervo: los dioses mesopotámicos se caracterizan por llevar un sombrero de cuernos (Van Buren 1943); no creo necesario recordar las frecuentes representaciones de Gilgamesh y Enkidu en las que uno de ellos aparece con cuernos; la egipcia Hathor lleva cuernos de vaca; Júpiter-Amón, cuernos de macho cabrío; ahí están el Minotauro greco-cretense y los faunos de la cultura clásica; aparecen personajes cornudos en petroglifos varios desde Siberia (Jacobson 1993: plate VIIc) al norte de Finlandia (Autio 1995) 14 y en la Cultura del Indo (cuarto a segundo milenios a. C.) (Srinivasan 1975); hay varios casos en las Estelas de Guerrero del Bronce final del Suroeste peninsular 15 ; en Cerdeña aparecen estatuillas de bronce de dioses o guerreros con casco de cuernos; aparece un antropomorfo con cuernas de reno sobre un tapiz hallado en una tumba escita de Pazyrik (Windfuhr 2000: fig.17); en una tumba de Hopewell (Chillicothe, Ohio, EE. UU.; 400 a. C.-100 d. ...
Este artículo examina qué puede aportar la arqueología sobre las relaciones entre el ciervo y las culturas humanas, como animal y como constructo cultural. La aproximación al tema es transcultural y abarca un amplio rango de tiempo, desde el Paleolítico en adelante. Se insiste en la universalidad del ciervo como fenómeno cultural.
... Countless studies have drawn attention to parallels in knives and animal motifs depicted on deer stones typically found in Mongolia (Fig. 11.4) and actual examples from northern China (Chlenova 2000;Kovalev 2007;Fitzhugh 2009). Archaeologists have pointed to the unique nature of these stelae to support theories for long-distance trade networks between the nomadic people of these regions (Rawson et al. 2020), facilitated through, and in its turn perhaps strengthening, a shared concept of the deer as a spiritual being (Jacobson 1993). ...
... It might be adequate at this point to conclude that the archaeological evidence does not support the model of Pazyryk ideology as warlike and violent. I am not the first to suggest otherwise: From an art historical perspective, Jacobson (1993 ) concluded that the deer image present in early Siberian art represented the role of the Great Mother in the cycle of birth, death and rebirth. It has been posited that the original Pazyryk burial ground was a "corporate cemetery of high priests" and that the Altai was the "sacral center of the Scythian world" ( Kurochkin 1993cited in Cheremisin 2007Latham 1958 ). ...
In this chapter, I argue that the Iron Age Inner Asian horse pastoralists termed “Early Nomads” have been mischaracterized as “fierce warriors” in previous archaeological interpretations, reflecting academic paradigms which give primacy to dominance, hierarchy and a unidirectional tracking of interspecies influence. Utilizing ethno-ethological findings, I reevaluate the archaeological data to query if and how the smaller-scale mutual interdependencies and interpersonal adaptations that occur between humans and horses – and are necessitated to large measure by horses’ ways of being – might have influenced larger-scale social arrangements within these societies. When viewed through this lens, the archaeological material supports a broader view of these societies, with certain practices indicating a focus not upon militaristic expansionism, but rather upon defensive pacifism. I suggest these people witnessed – and mimicked – the cooperative, heterarchical manner in which their horses interacted with one another, modeling some of their human social structures and ideological schemes after horses’ ways of being. This case study shows that a consideration of interspecies intersociality, a perspective wherein animals do not merely accommodate human ways but also reciprocally influence those ways, can offer fresh interpretations of animals’ impacts on human cultures in the past and present.
... Jacobson proposes that by donning the animal headdress, the ritualist became the animal itself and was reborn into its body and knowledge. Eliade (1972) spoke of a ritual adept's costume as representing 'a religious microcosm ' and Jacobson (1993) emphasised that such dress was a testament to this animal-human conflation and the power invested in the generative forces of nature. ...
A bighorn sheep horned headdress discovered near the Green River, in eastern Utah within the United States is reviewed. Its history, discovery and subsequent analysis is described. It appears to have been a powerful headpiece employed in a symbolic context for religious expression, perhaps worn by a ritualist in association with the hunt for large game animals (bighorn sheep, antelope or deer). It was likely associated with the Fremont Cultural Tradition, as it was dated by radiocarbon assay to a calibrated, calendar age of 1020-1160 CE and was further adorned with six Olivella biplicata shell beads (split-punched type) originating from the California coast that apparently date to that same general time frame. Such head-dresses are mentioned in the ethnographic literature for several Great Basin and American Southwestern indigenous cultures and appear to have been used in various religious rituals. Bighorn sheep horned headdresses can be fashioned directly from the horns of a bighorn sheep and can be functionally fashioned as a garment to be worn on the head without excessive weight and with little difficulty to the wearer. Ethnographic data testifies that the bighorn sheep was applied as a cultural symbol and was employed as a 'visual prayer' relating to the cosmic regeneration of life (e.g. good health, successful human reproduction, sufficient rain and water, and ample natural resource [i.e. animal and plant] fertility).
... The stylized images of this style prevail also on wooden, gold, and stone sculptures as well as on fur and felt. With elaborated antlers and heads transformed into bird-like beaked heads, the image of the deer was a key symbol of the Early Nomads (Jacobson 1993). Other significant images of the ' Animal style' were horses, feline and wolf-like predators, and eagles or eagle-griffins. ...
This chapter discusses the rock art traditions of Northern, Central, and Western Asia, first providing an overview of the chronological-cultural context of much of the known rock art in Northern and Central Asia before describing the main geographical concentrations of rock paintings and petroglyphs in the area. In particular, it examines the dilemmas with regards to ascertaining the age of ‘Stone Age’ rock art, along with the presence of chariots in rock art as an iconographic determinant of the Bronze Age. It also considers the association of the Bronze Age with the expansion of Indo-Iranians, expansion of Buddhism through Central Asia as reflected in the rock art, relation of Siberian rock art to shamanism, and major rock art regions of Northern and Central Asia. It concludes by assessing the rock art of Western Asia and how the advent of Islam in mid–seventh century ad changed Arabian traditions of rock art.
... Probably, before state formations, Turkic and Mongolian societies had had similar egalitarian gender relations, and after the state formations old understanding emerged in the new one through these narratives. These narratives shaped and re-shaped according to new ideological understandings (Jacobson 1993;180;Kubarev 1997: 239-246;Pustogaçev 1997: 283-306). Parallel to the social and political similarities, creation narratives or legends had great similarities. ...
... героических сказаний. Этот вопрос неоднократ-но ставился как объект изучения в археологической литературе, но специальных исследований мало [Гра- ков, 1950, с. 7-8;Hancar, 1976;Jacobson, 1993]. В то же время во всех работах, касающихся семантики изобра-жений, логически подразумевалось наличие в скиф-скую эпоху мифов и героических сказаний, отдель-ные элементы которых остались в качестве реликтов в фольклоре и эпосе современных народов. ...
This article describes a group of horsemen depicted on a plaque decorating a rectangular gold casing from the Siberian collection of Peter I. Based on a drawing of the item, published in 1890, the number of characters, their postures and state are assessed. Four horsemen are evidently alive and three are dead. The absence of stirrups indicates the Scytho-Sarmatian age. Judging by the evidence relating to the transportation of the dead among the Turco-Mongol peoples, the scene may be that of a funerary procession. In certain early nomadic burials, the “straddling” position of the deceased (supine with flexed and widely spread legs) is suggestive of dancing or riding. According to a convincing hypothesis proposed by O.V. Obelchenko, who reported such cases in the kurgans of Sogd dating to the 2nd to 1st century BC, the straddling posture of the deceased likely suggests that they had been transported to the grave in the saddle. The funerary procession shown on the gold casing supports such an interpretation. The scene, however, is hardly mundane. More likely, the characters are those of the Scytho-Sarmatian mythology or folklore.
... "Syano-altaisky Olen". (The Sayan-Altai deer Jacobson 1993;Jacobson 2015 another. The regions examined in this dissertation are exceptionally diverse as they incorporate the vast taiga and tundra of Siberia, the Mongolian, Kazakh and Pontic steppes, and various mountains regions such as the Urals which was home to the Lapp and Udmurt peoples. ...
Animal style is a centuries-old approach to decoration characteristic of the various cultures which flourished along the Eurasian steppe belt in the later half of the first millennium BCE. This vast territory stretching from the Mongolian Plateau to the Hungarian Plain, has yielded hundreds of archaeological finds associated with the early Iron Age. Among these discoveries, high-end metalwork, textiles and tomb furniture, intricately embellished with idiosyncratic zoomorphic motifs, stand out as a recurrent element. While scholarship has labeled animal-style imagery as scenes of combat, this dissertation argues against this overly simplified classification model which ignores the variety of visual tools employed in the abstraction of fantastic hybrids. I identify five primary categories in the arrangement and portrayal of zoomorphic designs: these traits, frequently occurring in clusters, constitute the first comprehensive definition of animal-style art. Each chapter focuses on the materiality and strategic placement of a different type of animal-style object: headdresses, torques and plaques often embellish the body of the deceased whereas felt, leather and silk textiles used as ceiling hangings, rugs, and coffin covers serve to define the tomb’s spatial parameters. Lastly, the dissertation also delves into the continuous retention of animal-style motifs in the arts of the Eurasian steppes after the dawn of the first millennium BCE thus challenging the narrative that animal art disappeared after the Iron Age. I demonstrate that elite members of the various pastoral societies perched along the peripheries of sedentary empires invented local interpretations of a common visual language made of tropes and devices (such as “visual synecdoche” and “frame narrative”) resulting from ingenious interpretations of the above-mentioned five categories. In so doing, they aimed to tackle an identical conceptual problem: the attendance of a real audience of a certain social stature during the funerary ceremony and the presence of an imagined (divine) one in the afterlife. The dissertation thus deconstructs the politically-motivated role of animal-style items in elite burials and argues that animal art was a constructed visual language intelligible to a small nucleus of elites whose sociopolitical status and network of influence were in fact inextricably linked to their level of fluency in it.
... Jacobson proposes that by donning the animal headdress, the ritualist became the animal itself and was reborn into its body and knowledge. Eliade (1972) spoke of a ritual adept's costume as representing 'a religious microcosm ' and Jacobson (1993) emphasised that such dress was a testament to this animal-human conflation and the power invested in the generative forces of nature. ...
A bighorn sheep horned headdress discovered near the Green River, in eastern Utah within the United States is reviewed. Its history, discovery and subsequent analysis is described. It appears to have been a powerful headpiece employed in a symbolic context for religious expression, perhaps worn by a ritualist in association with the hunt for large game animals (bighorn sheep, antelope or deer). It was likely associated with the Fremont Cultural Tradition, as it was dated by radiocarbon assay to a calibrated, calendar age of 1020-1160 CE and was further adorned with six Olivella biplicata shell beads (split-punched type) originating from the California coast that apparently date to that same general time frame. Such head-dresses are mentioned in the ethnographic literature for several Great Basin and American Southwestern indigenous cultures and appear to have been used in various religious rituals. Bighorn sheep, horned headdresses can be fashioned directly from the horns of a bighorn sheep and can be functionally fashioned as a garment to be worn on the head without excessive weight and with little difficulty to the wearer. Ethnographic data testifies that the bighorn sheep was applied as a cultural symbol and was employed as a 'visual prayer' relating to the cosmic regeneration of life (e.g. good health, successful human reproduction, sufficient rain and water, and ample natural resource [i.e. animal and plant] fertility).
... While these numbers may indicate a certain reluctance to retrospectively use terms that have been created on the basis of ethnographic evidence, some Russian scholars maintain that research on shamanism includes psychotherapy, psychology, and interdisciplinary research more generally as well as ethnology (Kharitonova 2007). 9 The scarcity of archaeological articles published in Russian and other Slavonic languages that deal with shamanism is however counterbalanced by a production of books and edited collections on Central Asian and Siberian shamanism in the past rather than in academic journals (for example Jacobson 1993;Martynov 1991;Price 2001;Rozwadowski 2008;Rozwadowski and Kośko 2002), but this corpus was not included in the research. ...
An analysis of terms, and keywords that have appeared over the last 50 years in the Anthropological Index (now AIO) challenges anthropology's purported universal coverage of regions and topics. Anthropological article production published in specialized periodicals leaves many areas uncovered, some topics marginalized, or absent. The article takes the presence or absence of keywords in articles in anthropological literature from all world regions to ask what may have generated these gaps. We argue that keyword use can reveal the role that geographical positioning, languages spoken, and national histories may have had in anthropological production. Shamanism and cognate concepts such as animism and spirit possession are taken to guide an analysis of the anthropological production in different languages through the use of keywords that appear in the coverage of AIO. The research demonstrates how far keywords use is shaped by contingent adjustments to predicaments and theoretical concerns with complex historical roots.
... The Issyk kurgan (or Golden Warrior tomb) from the Talgar fluvial fan, the largest excavated kurgan in the Semirechiye, suggests the 3rd and 2nd centuries BC as a period of notable occurrence of wealthy Saka kurgans in the Semirechiye. Formerly, Akishev (1978) assigned the Issyk kurgan the 6th and 3rd centuries BC. Jacobson (1993) refers the Issyk kurgan to 4th and 3rd centuries BC and later to the 5th century BC (Chang and Guroff 2008 ). The latest published date was 2255 ± 39 14 C yr with a 2 calibrated interval between 400 and 200 BC (Zaitseva et al. 2005 ). ...
This study employs tree-ring crossdating and radiocarbon measurements to determine the precise calendar age of the Bes-Shatyr Saka necropolis (43°47′N, 81°21′E) built for wealthy tribe leaders in the Ili River Valley (Semirechiye), southern Kazakhstan. We developed a 218-yr tree-ring chronology and a highly resolved sequence of ¹⁴ C from timbers of Bes-Shatyr kurgan #3. A 4-decadal-point ¹⁴ C wiggle dates the Bes-Shatyr necropolis to 600 cal BC. A 47-yr range of cutting dates adjusted the kurgan date to ∼550 BC. This is the first result of high-resolution ¹⁴ C dating produced for the Saka burials in the Semirechiye. The collective dating of Bes-Shatyr indicates the early appearance of the Saka necropolis in the Semirechiye eastern margins of the Saka dispersal. However, the date is a couple of centuries younger than previously suggested by single ¹⁴ C dates. It is likely that the Shilbiyr sanctuary (location of the Bes-Shatyr) became a strategic and sacral place for the Saka leadership in the Semirechiye long before 550 BC. Another prominent feature of the Semirechiye burial landscape, the Issyk necropolis enclosing the Golden Warrior tomb, appeared a few centuries later according to ¹⁴ C dating reported by other investigators. This study contributes to the Iron Age chronology of Inner Asia, demonstrating successful results of ¹⁴ C calibration within the Hallstatt Plateau of the ¹⁴ C calibration curve. It appears that the wide range of calibrated dates for the Saka occurrences in Kazakhstan (from 800 BC to AD 350) is the result of the calibration curve constraints around the middle of the 1st millennium BC.
... This form of artistic expression was widespread during the Iron Age and has been termed Eurasian Animal Style Art (Rostovtzeff 1922). Some scholars have argued for the deep temporal meaning of the deer motif, in particular, as being connected to traditions stemming from Siberian shamanism (Bayarsaikhan 2005) and stretching back to the Neolithic (Jacobson 1993). Such imagery typically depicts cervids, horses, and felines and can reflect great agency in the hybridization of animal species and their parts. ...
... 2) El mundo del varón Las armas y las escenas de su exhibición representadas en la roca son muy posiblemente una referencia a la guerra, la cual es propia de los varones en un porcentaje altísimo de sociedades, si bien en algunas de ellas la mujer puede tener un papel de relevancia en la guerra (ALONSO DEL REAL, 1967), (JACOBSON, 1993) o en la caza, aunque casi únicamente de animales menores. Por ello, es muy probable que estas actividades hayan estado en manos de varones, al igual que en otras partes de la Europa del momento, tal como se documenta a través del arte rupestre y los ajuares de las tumbas. ...
Rebutting previous claims, the paper employs comparative stylistic analysis and palaeoenvironmental data to argue that Angara style rock art originated in the Mongolian Altai during the Upper Palaeolithic (13,000–10,300 bp) where it evolved in situ. Around 8200–7300 bp, drought forced the hunter-gatherers who created Angara style rock art to migrate to the Upper Yenisey and the Selenga and Angara basins. When drought impacted that area c. 7500–7000 bp, Kotoi (Ket) culture descendants sought refuge in the resource-rich Minusinsk Basin. On the Middle Yenisey River, Angara style rock art served as a mnemonic device that encoded the syncretism of proto Ket and Evenki cosmologies and beliefs resulting from their social alliance.
Türk Kültüründe erken devirlerde özellikle totem olarak sanat eserlerinde de sıklıkla betimlenen geyik, bir kült imge olarak dikkati çekmektedir. Kültürümüzde yol gösterici, uğurlu ve kutsal bir ruh olarak kabul görmüştür. Özellikle sürek avlarında izi sürülen geyik, bu özelliği ile adeta yol gösterici bir kimliğe bürünmüşken, kırdığı boynuzlarının tekrar çıkmasıyla da yeniden doğuşun simgelerinden biri olarak kabul edilmiştir. Göktürklerde Alp Bahadır’ın geyik donuna bürünerek geyiklerle birlikte öteki dünyaya seyahati, cenaze törenlerinde vurularak kurban edilmesi, benzer şekilde Anadolu kültüründe özellikle Bektaşilikte don değiştirme kavramlarıyla kutsallığı kabul edilmiş bir varlıktır. Geyikli baba efsanesindeki gibi tarikat ehillerine yoldaş tutulmuştur. Anadolu kültüründe de geyik benzer özellikleri ile daima sevilmiş ve benimsenmiş bir hayvandır. Ayrıca Türk edebiyatında doğal güzelliği, zor yakalanması, ürkekliği ve zarafetiyle ulaşılması zor sevgiliyle de özdeşleştirilmiştir. Öte yandan Anadolu’da Bektaşilik başta olmak üzere bazı tarikatların önemli sembollerinden birisi olmuştur. Geyik donuna bürünerek hayvanın hızla yer değiştirmesi gibi bazı güçlerinin tarikat liderlerine geçtiğine inanılır. Bu rtiüel, Orta Asya Şamanlarının geyik donuna bürünerek iki dünya arasında hızlı yolculuğuyla benzerlik göstermektedir. Yine geyiğin, Geyikli Baba efsanesinde olduğu gibi günlük hayatta veya savaş gibi zorluklarda tarikat ehline yoldaşlık ettiğine de inanılır. Geyikle ilgili Türk kültüründeki tüm bu değişim ve dönüşümler, Orta Asya’dan Anadolu’ya üretilen bütün sanat eserlerinde- geyiğe yüklenen tüm anlamları karşılayacak şekilde- imgeleşmiş ve betimlenmiştir.
The ever-growing body of research on trans-Eurasian exchange during the third–first millennium bce continues to improve understanding of mechanisms that facilitated the movement of objects, materials, ideas, and even people. However, whether bronze mirrors in Central Asia and China represent the exchange of technological knowledge or movement of the objects themselves remains unresolved, as researchers require extensive knowledge of huge quantities of data generated during the Soviet Central Asia campaigns of the mid twentieth century. The often confusing, impenetrable excavation reports, combined with required knowledge of Chinese, Russian and English, have caused much confusion about dates and contexts. This article presents and compares data published in Russian and Chinese reports. By clarifying the chronology for mirrors in Central Asia and China, we challenge simplistic theories of object diffusion and spread that persist in studies of trans-Eurasian exchange. We argue that the early second-millennium bce appearance of mirrors in western and northwestern China resulted from different exchange mechanisms specific to each local socio-cultural context. This demonstrates not only the complexity of interactions at the group and individual levels, but also how these factors can be integrated with data-driven analyses to explore the role they played in large-scale Bronze Age exchange networks.
Birth was one of the most magical, miraculous, and blessed events of post-paleolithic spirituality. The Mesolithic - Early Neolithic rock art paintings of the Ranaldi Shelter (Southern Italy) give distinct visual evidence to a universal subject: the woman during childbirth and the wild animal which, given the context data, is the adult male red deer. The pivotal personage of the drama, Mother Ranaldi, shares her iconographic canon with the Goddess of Childbirth in prehistoric art. She is a majestic, naked, corpulent and fertile anthropomorph who is delivering a new life between her generous thighs. The depiction of the newborn’s head emerging from the vagina emphasizes her female power to procreate. Mother Ranaldi is birthing flanked by two adult stags which she touches with her sacred hands. They are not ordinary animals. Their supernatural nature is described by three features: exaggerated unnatural antlers, clear epiphanic seasonal nature, and bicephalism. They were symbol of worship to the Goddess of Generation, acting as her paredri (supporting, assisting partners). Ranaldi Shelter was used during the seasonal relocation of cervids, which in spring moved from the plains to the summer mountainous ranges. Then, the red paintings had not only a sacred value. Having totemic nature, they carried out a territorial function by contributing to organize and mark the territory, possibly associated with appropriate rituals.
This study presents the discovery of the first evidence of portable art sculptures from the Anzick Clovis site with red ochre infant burial and a Clovis artifact cluster, Wilsall, Montana. The site is considered one of the most important First Peoples sites in the Western Hemisphere. Previously no sculptures have been reported. At least sixteen (17) and up to forty (40) artifacts appear to have fair to good figurations, depicting zoomorphic, anthropomorphic and therianthropic beings. These depictions appear to represent at least nine (9) thematic or motif clusters of Clovis mythemes, spiritual-ecological, mortuary and ‘afterlife’ beliefs: 1) ‘Bear’, including Short-Faced Bear and Bear-Man; 2) ‘Mask Face with Different Eyes’; 3) 'Owl'; 4) ‘The Cycle of Birth, Death, Milky Way/Stars Path of Souls, and Reincarnation’; 5) 'Fox/Coyote'; 6) ‘Triangular Geometric with Elk (wapiti)’; 7) 'Frog/Toad'; 8) ‘Mammoth’; and 9) 'Vulture (Condor or Turkey) or Raven'. All of these mythic themes are predicted by Siberia/East Asia archaeological site portable art and ethnography. The results contradict the colonialist archaeological opinion that Clovis peoples forgot their spiritual and artistic heritage when the crossed Beringia into North America.
Based on the portable art and its reconstructed themes, it appears that the Anzick Clovis artifact cluster belonged to a shaman-storyteller. Some or all of the artifacts were sacred heirlooms for the use of that person's soul in the realm of the dead or beneficent ancestor realm, or for the use of a future shaman-storyteller in this life. A review of Siberia/East Asia and Northern western hemisphere Indigenous ethnography on infant burial indicates the Anzick infant burial was most likely designed for rapid reincarnation with no journey to a realm of the dead. If so, the current consensus hypothesis that the Anzick artifact cluster functioned as the deceased infant’s tool-kit-for-the-afterlife is not supported. If intentionally related, the goal of the Anzick Clovis infant’s mortuary rite would have been to rapidly reincarnate the soul of that infant with both its own soul and the soul of the deceased shaman-storyteller. If so, the Clovis artifact cluster was not for the afterlife, but for this life.
Further, based on the reconstructed themes depicted on the portable art in the artifact cluster —as well as the infant’s D4h3a-mtDNA—it is inferred that the Clovis infant buried at the Anzick site descended from a common ancestor of Ulchi, Oroch, Manchu and Mongolian tribes; from an ancestral homeland in the Lower Amur Basin Manchu to Sakhalin area; and from there, along a Pacific Rim migration route, via Magadan coast, perhaps Aleutians, into Pacific North West, and, possibly by marriage exchange, across Columbia and Snake Rivers into northern Plains.
KEY WORDS
Anzick site, Paleolithic (Americas), Paleo-Indigenous, First People, Paleoindian, Clovis, Clovis cache, ritual burial, grave goods, portable art, red ochre, figure stones
Non-sedentary cultures have existed on the scholarly fringes and historiographical outskirts of the art-historical canon: there they remain to this day, buried between dated opposites like “east” and “west,” “high” and “minor” arts, torn by interdisciplinary tensions in art history, archaeology and ethnography. Nomadic societies are usually considered in cross-cultural studies only insofar as they can act as sufficiently expedient intermediaries linking settled empires in the designated “East” and “West,” hence the recent fascination with the Pontic Scythians who bordered, traded and fought with ancient Greece, or the Xiongnu whose nomadic confederation became a geopolitical threat to early imperial China. Yet, early pastoral nomads bordering China and Greece left behind a rich corpus of gold adornment which points to an elaborate system of image-making and highly conceptual designs rooted in zoomorphism. The following article focuses on the strategies of self-fashioning and funerary decor employed in the entombment of the elite in the early nomadic societies of Central Eurasia. Golden suits, composed of metonymically conveyed animal images, along with foreign exotica, were the normative elements of a noble’s funeral. Adornment had to showcase the elite’s life on earth as that of a daring, globally recognized politician and a proud steppe resident.
Astronomy and religion have long been intertwined with their interactions resembling a symbiotic relationship since prehistoric times. Building on existing archaeological research, this study asks: do the interactions between astronomy and religion, beginning from prehistory, form a distinct religious tradition? Prior research exploring the prehistoric origins of religion has unearthed evidence suggesting the influence of star worship and night sky observation in the development of religious sects, beliefs and practices. However, there does not yet exist a historiography dedicated to outlining why astronomy and religion mutually developed, nor has there been a proposal set forth asserting that these interactions constitute a religious tradition; proposed herein as the Astronic tradition, or Astronicism. This paper pursues the objective of arguing for the Astronic tradition to be treated, firstly, as a distinct religious tradition and secondly, as the oldest archaeologically-verifiable religious tradition. To achieve this, the study will adopt a multidisciplinary approach involving archaeology, anthropology, geography, psychology, mythology, archaeoastronomy and comparative religion. After proposing six characteristics inherent to a religious tradition, the paper will assemble a historiography for astronomical religion. As a consequence of the main objective, this study also asserts that astronomical religion, most likely astrolatry, has its origins in the Upper Palaeolithic period of the Stone Age based on specimens from the archaeological record. The assertion is made that astrolatry is the original religion and fulfils the Urreligion theory. To end, the proposed characteristics of a religious tradition will be applied to Astronicism to ultimately determine whether it is a valid tradition that can stand alongside the established Abrahamic, Dharmic and Taoic traditions.
The series, directed by Lucio Milano, is devoted to the studies of ancient and late-ancient world. It is intended for hosting both publications arising from the research activities of Ca’ Foscari and publications of Italian and foreign scholars and institutions that help to highlight the academic network of national and international collaborations in the field of Classical. It is divided into four sections: History and Epigraphy; Archeology; Oriental Studies; Philology and Literature.
HORNED HUNTER-SHAMAN, ANCESTOR, AND DEITY There are numerous depictions of antlered figures in the rock art of prehistoric Eurasia and many representations of horned humans in the Far West of North America. These antlered and horned individuals have in some cases been interpreted as wearing animal headdresses. Headdresses with deer antlers are recognized archaeologically in Mesolithic Europe. A prehistoric bighorn sheep headdress has been discovered and dated from Utah in the United States. Also there is historic ethnographic evidence of deer and bighorn sheep headdresses/disguises for Siberia, northern Europe and North America. We propose to compare these data and review similarities and differences in these cultural traditions. We highlight comparative data regarding their age, and associated animal ceremonialism in indigenous religious expression.
HORNED HUNTER-SHAMAN, ANCESTOR, AND DEITY There are numerous depictions of antlered figures in the rock art of prehistoric Eurasia and many representations of horned humans in the Far West of North America. These antlered and horned individuals have in some cases been interpreted as wearing animal headdresses. Headdresses with deer antlers are recognized archaeologically in Mesolithic Europe. A prehistoric bighorn sheep headdress has been discovered and dated from Utah in the United States. Also there is historic ethnographic evidence of deer and bighorn sheep headdresses/disguises for Siberia, northern Europe and North America. We propose to compare these data and review similarities and differences in these cultural traditions. We highlight comparative data regarding their age, and associated animal ceremonialism in indigenous religious expression.
HORNED HUNTER-SHAMAN, ANCESTOR, AND DEITY There are numerous depictions of antlered figures in the rock art of prehistoric Eurasia and many representations of horned humans in the Far West of North America. These antlered and horned individuals have in some cases been interpreted as wearing animal headdresses. Headdresses with deer antlers are recognized archaeologically in Mesolithic Europe. A prehistoric bighorn sheep headdress has been discovered and dated from Utah in the United States. Also there is historic ethnographic evidence of deer and bighorn sheep headdresses/disguises for Siberia, northern Europe and North America. We propose to compare these data and review similarities and differences in these cultural traditions. We highlight comparative data regarding their age, and associated animal ceremonialism in indigenous religious expression.
Araştırmanın konusunu, Gürcistan’ın doğu sınırını da ihtiva eden Alazan (Alazani) Vadisinin Şeki, Fazıl-Cumakent yerleşim yeri ve Oğuz, Kerimli Köyü’nde yürütülen Azerbaycan’daki Bronz Çağı kültürlerine yönelik figür objelerin Türk kültüründeki anlamsal ortaklıkları ve bu bağlamda, Türk sanatı içerisindeki yerlerinin tespiti oluşturmaktadır. Bir kısmı geometrik özellikler sergileyen arkaik üsluplu buluntulardan som altından yapılmış boğa başı ile bronz ve terrakotadan insan biçimli heykelciklerin yanı sıra, yine aynı malzemelerden üretilen kuş figürinleri ve bronzdan geyik heykeli, Orta Asya Türk halklarının İslam öncesi dönem kurganlarına ait buluntuları çağrıştırmaktadır. Figür sembolizmi açısından eskiçağ kültür ve inancında da yer edinen bu öğelerin ikonografik/kozmografik kaynaklarına ulaşılacağı çalışmada, bazısı bilim dünyasına ilk kez tanıtılacak olan eserlerin sembolizminde, aynı zamanda Türk mitolojisindeki manalar aranmaya çalışılacaktır.
The present master thesis discusses the different motifs and elements which influenced the iconography of the Gundestrup cauldron.
The first chapter includes the latest state of art which consists of two sections. The first one describes the two main explanation models that have located the artefact's place of origin based on its iconography, whereas the second is about the technical investigations of the material which have been used for the making of the cauldron.
The second chapter describes the stag god Cernunnos and his various representations. The assumed origins of the figure are followed by finds of comparison on which a characteristic feature of Cernunnos appears: the cross-legged pose. The chosen objects originate from a geographical area that spans from the steppes of Eurasia to Gallia.
The third chapter brings in an example of comparison to the cauldron, a silver fragment from the hoard of Săliştea. A description of the objects and of the purchase of the hoard is included besides a detailed analysis as well as different interpretations of this artefact.
A list of sigils that are assigned to the ancient Indian Harappan Civilisation on which precursors of yoga figures are depicted can be found in the fourth chapter. In addition, parallels between ancient Indian and European image motifs are shown.
The existence of cultural contacts between India and the Mediterranean world, through which an intercultural exchange developed, are shown in the fifth chapter.
The sixth chapter demonstrates a development and transformation of an image, based on the motif 'The triumph of Dionysos'.
The seventh chapter contains possible theories that explain how the depictions from the Harappan Civilisation could have influenced the illustration of Cernunnos on the Gundestrup cauldron.
Very little precedent exists in Mongolia for excavating an ephemeral habitation site of prehistoric mobile pastoralists. This is due to an assumption that the kinds of nonpermanent structures constructed from perishable materials by mobile pastoralists (e.g., yurts) would be virtually undetectable in the archaeological record. Working in the Tarvagatai Valley of north-central Mongolia, the goal of the current research is to test the viability of methodological and analytical techniques used in the investigation of Palaeolithic hunter-gatherer habitations for the purpose of identifying a mobile pastoralist domicile of the Early Iron Age. The following study presents an overview of the methodology implemented during the excavation and the analysis used to identify what appear to be indications of one of the earliest mobile structures so far identified in the Mongolian steppe.
In this essay we address a prehistoric bighorn sheep, horned headdress from the Tommy Morris Collection which was formerly exhibited at the Utah State University Eastern Prehistoric Museum in Price, Utah [Prehistoric Museum], in the United States (Figure 1). This remarkable artifact was recovered from the vicinity of Robber’s Roost in the San Rafael Desert, within an area west of the Green River, the Great Basin in the western desert of North America. This region is considered to be the former homeland to both Desert Archaic and Fremont peoples and both regularly hunted bighorn sheep and created rock art imagery (both rock drawings and paintings) featuring horned anthropomorphs and the depictions of bighorn sheep.
The San Rafael Swell, just to the west, is also the core area for the distribution of Barrier Canyon Style pictographs (rock paintings), and all major river canyons in this area include painted rock art galleries containing anthropomorphs, some of which are adorned with what appear to us and other researchers as bighorn sheep horned-headdresses.
We wish to assert that bighorn sheep headdresses were an element of the Fremont Culture from the San Rafael Swell dating to AD 1020 - 1160. We draw on evidence inferred from a bighorn sheep headdress discovered in this region and describe certain rock art images to extend the inference. Regional (Great Basin and American Southwest) and pan-cultural ethnographic descriptions strengthen our argument and provide a basis for reconstructing the possible meaning and symbolism of bighorn sheep religious metaphor.
Methods and Theories Recognizing, Classifying, and Contextualizing Sexed/Gendered Images What Do We Know? Concluding Thoughts Notes References
The Smithsonian Museum Conservation Institute Workshop on Biocolonization of Stone was the second workshop in a series and was dedicated to research on removal and control of biocolonization in stone objects. Twelve presentations were made, and the workshop ended with a roundtable discussion open to the 71 attendees. The goal was to provide a discussion forum for biologists, material scientists, and conservators interested in stone biodeterioration. Seven papers were presented, ranging from microbiological laboratory studies to combination of on-site testing and laboratory evaluation for World Heritage Sites such as Angkor Wat, to a literature overview. Five case studies were also presented, covering control of biodeterioration at Veterans Affairs cemeteries, experience gathered from the installation of zinc strips at the Stanford Mausoleum in San Francisco, the red staining found on the marble of the Memorial Amphitheater at Arlington National Cemetery, problems posed by deer stones in Mongolia, and the site test installed at San Ignacio Mini Jesuit Missions in Misiones, Argentina. The roundtable and discussions drew attention to the importance of exploring new methods to prevent microbial colonization of stone. Finally, in a closed session, suggestions were offered for developing criteria to evaluate microbial growth and determine when treatment is necessary. It was recommended that a database be prepared on stone biocolonization and its control.
The Late Bronze Age archaeology of the Northern Zone provides a basis for understanding how the Inner Asian frontier with China gradually emerged. With only a few exceptions, most discussions of Northern Zone political process have included little information about the neighboring archaeological regions in southern and eastern Mongolia. Although the archaeological record of these regions is still not well known, new data from the past decade of intensive survey and excavation in the southern and eastern Gobi Desert have helped to clarify the interactive networks that existed between Mongolian and Inner Mongolian communities of the Late and Final Bronze Age. In this chapter, I develop an argument for early contacts between these regions and explore their consequences for the late Shang and Western Zhou states of China.
While a great deal of scholarship has been dedicated to the Late Bronze Age cultures of Inner Asia generally the site types, material patterns, and ancient lifeways of Mongolia during this time period are still little known. In terms of understanding organizational changes in Inner Asia, however, Mongolia is a critical region. This chapter provides an overview of major sites and material patterns of the Late and Final Bronze Age archaeological record from Mongolia. I pay particular attention to issues of subsistence and mobility, monumentality and social differentiation, and the development of metallurgical and transport technologies.
The finding of a male red deer (Cervus elaphus L.) skeleton at Brandýs nad Labem (Central Bohemia, Czech Republic) dated to the Únětice culture (Early Bronze Age), radiocarbon dated to 1881–1679 cal BC (P 93 %), unique in the region, was analysed archaeozoologically. The depositing of a whole, unbutchered and entirely undamaged, but curled up body of a stag in a relatively small pit dug into the bottom of a large storage pit undoubtedly had some kind of special meaning or significance. It is interpreted as the burial of a ritually sacrificed beast. The deer male aged 2.5–3 years, with a withers height ca 129 cm, was in good health and had well-developed antlers. The stag most probably died between January and April, probably more towards the spring, but exactly how it died is unclear. The ritual appears to have been quite complex since it included a fire at the bottom of the storage pit. Deposition in a place designed for storage could suggest a ceremony relating to a sacrifice for prosperity and a good harvest. Despite a lack of evidence for the use of deer in rituals and the symbolic sphere during the Bronze Age, deer burials and the symbolic significance of the stag are known from other archaeological cultures and ethnicities. Interestingly, the entire foreleg of a younger red deer (aged 4–7 months), an isolated humerus of another young fawn (0.5–2 months) and the remains of two dog puppies (3.5–4.5 months) were present in upper horizons of the storage pit, which could also have a special meaning.
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Mother Mary in the Rising Sun: A “Ritual Drama” among the Csango Hungarians
The paper deals with the origin and symbolism of the multirooted rite of “Looking into the Sun at Dawn,” performed yearly on Pentecost, as a part of the Csíksomlyó indulgence (Şumuleu Ciuc, Romania) organised by the Catholic Church. Predominantly female ethnic Csango Hungarians performed this rite until the 21st century, and in the course of their communal visions they often saw the shape of Virgin Mary in the rising sun. The local Franciscan church shelters a 16th century Mother Mary statue — to which miraculous powers are attributed, reflecting the iconography of Mulier Amicta Sole. The paper concludes that the form of Virgin Mary taking shape in the ritualized communal visions does not only incorporate the concept of the Virgin Mother of God but also the one of the pre-Christian ancestress. By methods of comparative mythology and ritual analysis, employing written sources this paper makes an attempt to present how in their deer chasing origin myth, the Huns and Hungarians worshiped the ancestress in the figure of the doe, which they identified with the sun. The conclusion of the study is that the primeaval connection of the sun with the ancestress was adopted into Christianity reapearing in the ritualized communal visions.
Maryja Matka Boża w słońcu o świcie: „dramat obrzędowy” u Csango na Węgrzech
Artykuł dotyczy określenia źródeł i symboli niejednorodnego obrzędu „Patrzenia w Słońce o świcie” wykonywanego co roku w trakcie Zielonych Świątek w ramach odpustu w Csíksomlyó (Şumuleu Ciuc w Rumunii), organizowanego przez Kościół katolicki. Obrzędu wykonywanego również dziś, głównie przez kobiety należące do grupy etnicznej Csango na Węgrzech, które w trakcie wspólnych wizji często dostrzegają postać Maryi Panny we wschodzącym Słońcu. W lokalnym kościele oo. franciszkanie przechowują XVI-wieczną figurę Matki Bożej odzwierciedlającą ikonografię Mulier Amicta Sole, której przypisuje się cudowną moc. Autor artykułu wskazuje się, że postać Maryi Panny nabierająca kształtu w zrytualizowanych wspólnych wizjach odnosi się nie tylko do koncepcji Bogarodzicy Dziewicy, ale do jednej z przedchrześcijańskich przodkiń. Dzięki metodom komparatystyki mitologicznej i analizie rytuałów zawartych w źródłach pisanych artykuł ten stanowi próbę omówienia, jak w micie o pogoni za jeleniem Hunowie i Węgrzy czcili tę przodkinię w postaci łani, którą utożsamiali ze Słońcem. Konkluzją artykułu jest to, że pierwotny związek Słońca z ową przodkinią został przejęty przez chrześcijaństwo i przywrócony w zrytualizowanych wspólnych wizjach.</p
This paper presents new archaeozoological evidence for horse pastoralism and transport in Mongolia's Deer Stone–Khirigsuur (DSK) Complex (circa 1300–700 BCE). As both livestock and transport, the domestic horse fundamentally altered life in the dry steppe of eastern Eurasia. However, the timing and process of mobile pastoralism's adoption in Mongolia and Northeast Asia remains poorly understood. To evaluate previous suggestions of late Bronze Age horse herding in the DSK complex, I produced age and sex estimates for archaeological horse crania from DSK sites across Mongolia. This sample yielded a high proportion of juvenile animals and an elderly female specimen, consistent with the culling practices of contemporary equine pastoralists. However, the sample also contained a significant proportion of ‘prime age’ adult male animals. This finding is seemingly inconsistent with the practical requirements of pastoral herd management, but comparable with other archaeological assemblages of ritually-sacrificed transport horses. Spatial comparison suggests that these adult males were buried in specific ritual contexts, along the eastern edge of stone mounds known as khirigsuurs, while osteological features of the premaxilla point to harnessing or heavy exertion. Together, these data provide compelling evidence that adult male DSK horses were used for chariotry or mounted riding. Results support the interpretation of DSK people as early mobile pastoralists, and suggest an important role for horse transport in late Bronze Age social dynamics and the development of herding societies in Northeast Asia.
Paintings and engravings on cliffs, boulders, and the walls of rock-shelters and caves often can be better understood by thinking about them with gender in mind. Who made images on stone? What kinds of people do anthropomorphic images represent? More important, what can rock art tell us about the gendered lives and gendered worldviews of ancient peoples? This chapter explores the often complicated gendered dimensions of rock art iconography, technology, style, and landscape placement. All art is gendered, be it images that represent bodies or those that are abstract. Art is gendered by codes of production, who produces it and who consumes it. (Dowson 2001 :321).
Previous StudiesUsing Multivariate Statistics to Analyze Rock Art DataNorth American Early Hunting TraditionSouth Siberian Early Petroglyph StylesConclusions
References
What is the distinction between human rights and social justice frameworks? In heritage contexts, distinctions do matter. Despite its potential in protecting cultural heritage and mediating conflict, human rights regimes have been overburdened in taking on heritage issues. In certain contexts, an inclusion of a social justice agenda provides advocacy and voice to communities whose needs have been marginalized. A social justice approach is positioned to take on issues of inequalities, injustices, or violations of heritage and cultural rights, and provide avenues for “communities of connection” (indigenous, subaltern, descendant, and local communities) to challenge how their heritage is represented.
Archaeological and ethnographic literature on human animal relations in southern Siberia is marked by an emphasis on the origin of reindeer domestication and the development of the Saian style of reindeer husbandry. Explorers of the early 20 th century, such as Alexander Carruthers (1914) and Ørjan Olsen (1915 a; 1915 b), were among the first to draw attention to southern Siberia as a place of origins. This way of representation perhaps finds its hiatus in the work of Soviet archaeologist and ethnographer Sevian Vainshtein (1972). Although the focus of the debate on the origins of reindeer domestication has since shifted to genetics, the ethnography of southern Siberia remains influential in non-indigenous representations of the lives of indigenous peoples residing within the Saian region. In this paper I attempt to briefly outline two themes that can be identified in the literature on the Saians: the 'original homeland' theme, and the prevalent emphasis on reindeer husbandry. I respond to these themes with a call for a multispecies approach to ethnography in the Saians, and by suggesting renewed attention to the role of local cosmology in human-animal relations of the region.
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