Archaeology, Ethnology & Anthropology of Eurasia 45 (4) 2017   DOI: 10.17746/1563-0110.2017.45.4.102-112

Annotation:  New Data on the Chronology of the Initial Neolithic Gromatukha Culture, Western Amur Region Holocene Fishing in the Big Sea Region of Lake Baikal (Based on Materials from Multilayered Habitati Comparative Characteristics of Stone Tools from the Neolithic Sites on the Upper and Middle Kama On the History of Asian Bosporus in the Early Byzantine Times: Excavations at Verkhnegostagayevskoye The Jomon Megalithic Tradition in Japan: Origins, Features, and Distribution A Morphological Analysis of Malyshevo Middle Neolithic Pottery from the Lower Amur New Absolute Dates for the Trans-Uralian and Western Siberian Neolithic Anthropomorphic Bronze Masks from the Timiryazevo-1 Burial Ground A Multidisciplinary Study of Burial Mounds and a Reconstruction of the Climate of the Turan-Uyuk De Classifi cation of 9th–13th Century Arrowheads Found in Azerbaijan Chinese Lacquerware from the Pazyryk Burial Ground Chineta II, Altai A Late 16th to Early 17th Century Mongolian Ceremonial Helmet from the Moscow Kremlin Armoury Dendrochronological Methods in the Architectural and Ethnographic Study of Russian Towns in Siberia Kinship Analysis of Human Remains from the Sargat Mounds, Baraba Forest-Steppe, Western Siberia Intragroup Variation of the Facial Skeleton in 16th–19th Century Rural Russian Populations in the W   

Chinese Lacquerware from the Pazyryk Burial Ground Chineta II, Altai

P.K. Dashkovskiy¹ and О.G. Novikova²

¹Altai State University, Pr. Lenina 61, Barnaul, 656049, Russia

²State Hermitage Museum, Dvortsovaya nab. 34, St. Petersburg, 190000, Russia

This article describes fragments of lacquer from the early nomadic burials in mounds 21 and 31 at Chineta II, northwestern Altai. Their location in the graves, material, and distribution pattern suggest that these fragments belonged to wooden cups. The analysis, which included methods of analytical chemistry, infrared and Fourier spectrometry, revealed that the remains of paint resembled those of Chinese lacquerware coatings based on qi-lacquer ??. The analysis of the paint layers showed that the lacquer coatings were manufactured following the traditional technology used in ancient China. The red upper layers, similar to those known as zhu-qi ??, were applied over dark brown layers of qi-lacquer (?). Parallels are found among the Chinese lacquers from Pazyryk, Bugry II, etc., owned by the State Hermitage Museum. The comparison of samples from Chineta II with those from high-ranking Scythian Age burials in the Altai suggests that lacquer items were imported by the nomads from a single manufacturing center in China in the Scythian period. It has been suggested that persons buried at Chilikta II mounds 21 and 31 must have belonged to the elite, although these burials were inferior to the “royal ” mounds at Tuekta, Pazyryk, Bashadar, Berel, Katanda, etc., in terms of status.

Keywords: Altai, early nomads, Pazyryk culture, funerary rite, Chinese lacquerware, qi-lacquer (?), FTIR spectroscopy, science-based methods