2024/05/17 by Kungurova, N.
paper · doi:10.34920/1694-5794-2022.36en.002
The article examines materials from excavations of a ground burial ground of the Scythian era,located on the Pre-Altai Plain, on the territory of the Altai Republic (Russia). The burial ground belongs to the complex of monuments of the Bystryansk culture, distributed along the territory of the left bank of the lower Katun in the northern foothills of Altai. His materials have never been published, but the unlooted burials made it possible to observe the most interesting facts of the ritual, integral to the area of distribution of the Pazyryk culture. The article presents brief overviews of the burials and the related grave goods, drawing a comparison with the artifacts from the burial grounds of the Bystryanka culture on the right bank of the Katun and Biya. The results of radiocarbon dating are given, based on samples of burnt wood from four burials of the Rubtsovsky burial ground, covering the period of the early 6th-5th centuries BCE. Comparisons of radiocarbon dating with the dates of the Pazyryk mounds were made, showing their synchronicity. The features of gender differentiation of the funerary rite are identical, as supported by the details in the Pazyryk burials preserved by the permafrost. It is concluded that the left bank population of the Bystryanka culture (the Rubtsovo burial ground) was left by a group directly related to the Pazyryk population of Altai.