Barrow of Timber-Grave culture of Zintseva Balka burial ground (North-Eastern Azov Sea littoral).

Abstract

Several years ago an archaeological expedition of Donetsk Regional Museum excavated a barrow group which consisted of 4 mounds located at suburb of Mariupol (Donetsk province, Ukraine). The barrow 4 is the only one in the group which was mounded in the late Bronze Age and in which there where burials of Timber-Grave culture only. This barrow is also remarkable because the exploration of the mound has revealed some cases of straight stratigraphy of several burials of the same culture. Moreover, an anthropological analysis of the deceased has revealed that most of the burials excavated in the centre of the barrow were female and only one burial was male, it was singled out in planigraphy besides (located at the edge of the mound). The paper presents materials of excavation of barrow 4, profoundly describes its stratigraphy, and emphasizes a practice of “separation” of the deceased which was observed by people of Timber-Grave culture. The authors were interested in a problem of existence of “female” barrows. They have considered 189 barrows which contained the Timber-Grave culture burials of women (burials both primary and secondary buried in a barrow). The authors have explored 93 barrows at the eastern territory of Timber-Grave cultural-historical community (the Middle and the Lower Volga reaches, the Southern Ural Mountains) and 96 barrows at the western territory (Dnepr-Donets region, the Don reaches, Ciscaucasia). According to a correlation of different sex and age groups of burials the authors have divided the barrows into groups within the frameworks of generalized “Eastern” and “Western” territories. The analysis of groups has enabled the authors to conclude that on both territories of Timber-Grave community there was quite strictly observed practice of burying some of women separately from men, children and teenagers. They buried women separately from children and teenagers rather than together with them. At the same time, they buried women with children and teenagers more often than with men in one barrow. One woman was buried much more often than two or more in “female” barrows. The barrow 4 of Zintseva Balka burial ground is unique among all known “female” barrows because of a “record” correlation of female and male burials. It is also outstanding because a corpus of burials of this barrow had been forming throughout a long period of time (nor less but rather more than two centuries) which implies that this mound, which seems usual at first sight, was very meaningful.