Paper

A Different Archaeology # Pazyryk culture: a snapshot, Ukok, 2015

Thu, 17 Dec 2015 00:00:00 +0300

Times destroys everything. The more surprising it is when something living – things made of organic materials – comes to us from high antiquity.

It can take years to speculate about what the discovered “decorations” served for and what they decorated or, driven to despair by the failure to solve this riddle, to refer to the enigmatic thing as “an object with an unknown function” – and only organics can establish connections between scattered findings.

Fabrics and fur, felt and leather, threads and pelts, and sometimes, lo and behold, the human body itself, carefully embalmed and preserved against all odds, dot the i’s and cross the t’s, and you are heart-struck by what you’ve seen…

For the first time this happened in Ukok. After we came across the “frozen graves” of the Pazyryk culture, archaeology for us split into the archaeology we had known before 1990 and the one that we knew after.

I think this is a different archaeology

Ecological Crisis on Lake Baikal: Diagnosed by Scientists

Sun, 30 Aug 2015 00:00:00 +0300

A few years ago, one could not even imagine that these words would be written about Lake Baikal, the deepest and purest lake in the world, which is now on the UNESCO World Heritage list.

The first sign of the ecological crisis on Baikal was the rampant proliferation of the atypical filamentous Spirogyra alga. According to limnology scientists, the cause of the disaster was not global warming or other planetary-scale phenomena, but an excessive inflow of nutrients such as nitrogen and phosphorus into the lake. The studies revealed the culprit—the industrial and domestic wastewaters coming into the lake from ineffective or dilapidated wastewater treatment facilities located in coastal towns and the bilge and fecal waters from the numerous vessels.

So far these effects have been confined to the lake’s coastal zone and have not affected its deep part and, thus, the hydrochemical indicators of the Baikal water. However, the process does not stop, and untreated and poorly treated wastewater continues to flow, slowly but surely, into the sacred Baikal...

Oil and Gas of the Russian Arctic: History of Development in the 20th Century, Resources, and Strategy for the 21st Century

Sun, 30 Aug 2015 00:00:00 +0300

Today, Russia is one of the three world leaders in the production of hydrocarbons: in 2014, our country produced 525 million tons of oil and 668 billion m³ of natural gas. At the same time, more than 90% of our gas and 10% of oil comes from the deposits in the Russian sector of the Arctic. In this article, Alexey Kontorovich shares his vision of the present and future of the oil-and-gas industry in the northern regions of Russia and the main lessons of the development of the unique Arctic hydrocarbon resources. Kontorovich, a major expert on oil industry, one of the authors of Energy Strategy of Russia, and a student and coworker of the prominent oil scientist Andrey Trofimuk, directly participated in the discovery of the world's oldest oil fields on the Siberian platform

Steppe Fashion. Items from the Wardrobe of Ancient Nomads

Sun, 30 Aug 2015 00:00:00 +0300

For most of us, the word Xiongnu bears an association the Huns, the nomadic tribes whose raids terrified the Ancient Rome. In fact, the Xiongnu do have a "genetic relationship" with the Huns. All we know about this legendary nation of the past, who created the world's first nomadic empire, known mostly from the ancient chronicles its great neighbor, the Chinese Han Empire. The source of important information on the history and culture of the Xiongnu, as well as all ancient civilizations of Central Asia, China, and the Middle East, are the tumuli of Noin-Ula in the northern Mongolia, where noble representatives of this nomadic nation were buried about 2,000 years ago.

In 2012, during excavations of Tumulus 22 in Noin-Ula, which had been robbed in ancient times, the Russian-Mongolian archaeological expedition discovered a large number of original items, including unique textiles. Of the steppe leader’s costume, which was decorated with truly barbarian pompousness, only his leggings—unstitched pant legs attached to a belt—were more or less intact. The leggings, which were made of purple fabric embroidered with silk and ended with felt boots, were likely worn over simple silk or woolen pantaloons and served as a fancy clothing item. The dye, the plain weave, the quality of the seams and embroidery, and the shape of the patterns suggest that this textile items reflects the fashions and technological trends of three different cultures of that time

On the Path to Celestial Pastures

Tue, 30 Dec 2014 00:00:00 +0300

The first mummies of the Pazyryk people were discovered in the mid-20th century during excavations in Eastern Altai. In 1993 the world saw a truly sensational discovery: in the mound Ak-Alakh-3 on the Ukok Plateau, archaeologists found a “frozen” sepulcher with the mummified body of a young Pazyryk woman and a set of items accompanying her to the other world. Among all the Pazyryk findings, the woman buried on Ukok attracted the greatest public attention.

Although over two decades have passed since the discovery of her embalmed remnants, the posthumous fate of the Ukok Princess remains the topic of a heated debate. There is compelling evidence of a high status of the buried woman, i.e., the accompanying burial of a man and three racing horses and the rare outlandish items such as silks and coriander seeds as well as the solitary position of the mound, which was located at a prominent point in a river valley. A tomographic study of the mummified remnants, which was conducted two decades after the discovery, revealed new facts supporting the archaeologists’ hypothesis about a special status of the buried woman as a Spirits’ Chosen, thus providing a unique insight into the life and death of a woman who lived more than 2,500 years ago

“We Drank Soma, We Became Immortal…”

Mon, 30 Aug 2010 00:00:00 +0400

Inside a deep Xiongnu grave hidden in the thickly wooded Sudzuktè pass, on the bottom of the burial chamber, archaeologists, participants of the Russian-Mongolian expedition, found what they had long been searching for: a layer of clay revealing the outline of textile relics. The fragments of the textile found were parts of a carpet composed of several cloths of dark-red woolen fabric. The time-worn cloth found on the floor covered with blue clay of the Xiongnu burial chamber and brought back to life by restorers has a long and complicated story. It was made someplace in Syria or Palestine, embroidered, probably, in north-western India and found in Mongolia.

Finding it two thousand years later is a pure chance; its amazingly good condition is almost a miracle. How it made its way to the grave of a person it was not meant for will long, if not forever, remain a mystery. Of greatest surprise though was the unique embroidery made from wool. Its pattern was the ancient Zoroastrian ceremony, of which the principal personage was …a mushroom. In the center of the composition to the left of the altar is the king (priest), who is holding a mushroom over the fire. The «divine mushroom» embroidered on the carpet resembles well-known psychoactive species Psilocybe cubensis.

The weight of evidence suggests that soma, the ancient ritual drink, has been prepared from the mushrooms of family Strophariaceae which contain the unique nervous system stimulator psilocybin

Food without "Soul" Does Not Fill. Social and Ritual Aspects of Yakuts' Traditional Diet

Fri, 30 Apr 2010 00:00:00 +0400

"Food occupies a highly important place in Yakut beliefs, mainly in what concerns sacrifice offerings and "negative" taboo magic. According to Yakuts' beliefs, food (similarly to any other object) has a soul of its own, which is its quintessence, or vital principle, concluded in a material body. In part, it is this belief that underlies the theory of food sacrificing. For example, they used to put dishes with various meals and drinks in front of a god's image; the offerings were later given to old people, who had to do with food without "soul." " This is an extract from the monograph of Yakut ethnographer A.A. Savvin (1896-1951), devoted to Yakuts' traditional nutrition system. It was published first fifty years after author's death.

In this publication we are turning to the unique materials concerned with the spiritual aspects of this northern people's traditional diet. They were collected by the scholar during many years of field research at the time when some of the customs and rituals described were not an ethnographic rarity but a part of everyday life. Ethnographic approach to food studies allowed A. A. Savvin, as early as in the first half of the 20th century, to near the understanding of the food's important role as a universal adaptive cultural mechanism

Alcohol and Hallucinogens in the Life of Siberian Aborigines

Tue, 25 Dec 2007 00:00:00 +0300

The Second Kamchatka, or Great Northern, Expedition (1733—1743), whose plan was developed by the Senate and Admiralteistv-Collegia* of St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences, was a large-scale exploratory journey designed to investigate Russian nature and population.

Many of the valuable documents and manuscripts of this expedition — letters, travel journals, geographic descriptions, etc. — kept in archives have been published only recently or are yet being prepared for publication. “SCIENCE First Hand” has published a few articles dedicated to this academic project, including papers on the life and scholarly activities of G. F. Müller, J. G. Gmelin and G. W. Steller, who were members of this expedition.

The December issue of SCIENCE First Hand (# 6 (12), 2006) featured documents of the Second Kamchatka Expedition dealing with the role of alcohol in the life of 18th century Russian Siberians. The present article dwells on the alcoholic habits of Siberian aborigines as well as on their consumption of hallucinogenic mushrooms and other narcotics producing euphoria and stupor.

*The top level governmental body organized by Peter I in 1718, which was in charge of the Navy

A Description of Siberian Peoples. Indigenous Peoples of Siberia: Marriage and Family

Mon, 30 May 2005 00:00:00 +0400

G. F. Mueller was an outstanding investigator of Siberia, a member of the academic detachment of the Second Kamchatka Expedition organized in 1733–1743. In the course of his decennial peregrination, he was the first among Russian researchers to carry out comprehensive comparative studies of the ethnic history, languages, social relations, material and spiritual cultures of all indigenous peoples of Siberia. Mueller’s works written during the expedition and devoted to these topics are about 3,000 pages long. Modern investigators are especially interested in the data Mueller collected directly from the aborigines. Gentle manners, gifts and respectful attitude to their religion and practices helped him to make friends in all the strata of the aboriginal society: from peasants to clan grandees, and from regular shamans to learned Muslim and Buddha priests.