Archaeology, Ethnology & Anthropology of Eurasia 38 (1) 2010

Annotation:  Siliceous Rock of the Southern Urals: Distribution and Usage in the Stone Age Periods, Boundaries, and Contact Zones in the Far Eastern Insular World of the Neolithic (Based on Oyster Cultivation and Archaeology as Producing Activities Early Iron Age Dyupsya Burial, Central Yakutia The “Osmium Trace” in Mineral Inclusions in Ancient Gold Artifacts Social Structure of the Early Medieval Population in the Upper Kama Region (Based on Evidence from t Bronze Helmet Recently Discovered in Mongolia The Matchmaker’s Staffs from Fort Nadym of the 17th–18th Centuries Dendrochronological Survey of the Towers from the Kazym Ostrog Dendrochronological Dating of the Groundsill for the Bell Tower of the Spasskaya Church in Irkutsk Marriages among the Tobol-Irtysh Tatars in the Late 18th – Early 20th Centuries The Altai Cossacks in the 18th – Early 20th Centuries ANTHROPOL A Fossil Human Humerus from Khvalynsk: Morphology and Taxonomy Skeletal Remains from Buston VI – a Sapalli Culture Cemetery in Uzbekistan New Craniometric Evidence on the Origin of the Karelians (the Kylalahti Kalmistomäki Burial Ground) The Maikop Crania Revisited   

The Matchmaker’s Staffs from Fort Nadym of the 17th–18th Centuries

O.V. Kardash.

Peculiar artifacts described in this article were found at Fort Nadym, a 17th – early 18th-century Russian administrative center in aboriginal Western Siberia. Based on ethnographic data, these artifacts were identifi ed as matchmaker’s staffs. An attempt at a historical reconstruction of wedding rituals of the aboriginal people of northwest Siberia was made. The Nadym staffs were analyzed along with the data from the Ostyak and Samoyedic synchronous sites from the Voikar and Polui (Obdor) settlements and the Russian town of Mangazeya. Results of the study indicate that the matchmaker’s staff as an element of wedding rituals of the Ostyaks and Samoyeds of Western Siberia performed the function of a trade and exchange agreement. As such, it was formed not earlier than the mid-17th century, apparently because of the Russian population infl uence in the region.

Keywords: Northwest Siberia, Fort Nadym, Ostyaks, Samoyeds, wedding rituals, matchmaker’s staff