Archaeology, Ethnology & Anthropology of Eurasia 46 (2) 2018   DOI: 10.17746/1563-0110.2018.46.2.079-089

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Old Turkic Stone Enclosures at Kyzyl-Shin, Southeastern Altai

G.V. Kubarev

Institute of Archaeology and Ethnography, Siberian Branch, Russian Academy of Sciences, Pr. Akademika Lavrentieva 17, Novosibirsk, 630090, Russia

This study outlines the results of excavations of five Old Turkic stone enclosures (No. 1, 6, 9, 12, and 18) at the memorial complex Kyzyl-Shin, in the Kosh-Agachsky District of the Altai Republic. Owing to soil conditions and to the presence of air in some offering chambers, unique artifacts were discovered—a wooden box, wooden dishes, armor plates, etc. These finds extend our knowledge of Old Turkic offerings and Turkic ritualism in general. They have enabled us to reconstruct the stages of the construction of enclosures and their separate elements. The presence of nonfunctional (votive) artifacts highlights a key feature of the Old Turkic memorial ritualism, supporting the idea that enclosures were ritual models of dwellings—abodes of the deceased persons’ spirits/souls. Well-preserved larch tree trunks, dug into the ground in their centers, offered the possibility for cross-checking the results of radiocarbon and dendrochronological analyses, suggesting that the enclosures date to the late 6th and 7th century AD. Although the Kyzyl-Shin enclosures belong to the Yakonur type, they are contemporaneous with adjacent enclosures of the Kudyrge type, suggesting that the typology of archaeological structures does not always mirror their chronological and evolutionary relationship. Differences in the construction and arrangement of enclosures could be determined by other factors such as family or social structure.

Keywords: Southeastern Altai, Old Turks, memorial enclosures, altar, larch tree trunks, votive artifacts, dendrochronological analysis, radiocarbon dating