Archaeology, Ethnology & Anthropology of Eurasia 46 (3) 2018   DOI: 10.17746/1563-0110.2018.46.3.059-065

Annotation:  The Discovery of a Bifacial Industry in Vietnam Technological Development of the Neolithic Pottery at Göytepe (West Azerbaijan) Reconstruction of Extreme Paleoclimatic Events in Northwestern Siberia Using Ancient Wood from Fort On the Construction Features of Wheeled Vehicles in Iran and Mesopotamia (Third to First Millennia B The Adaptation of the Seima-Turbino Tradition to the Bronze Age Cultures in the South of the West Si A Half of a Metal Bipartite Mold of the Seima-Turbino Period from the Upper Irtysh Region Zotino III: An Early Iron Age Metallurgical Center in the Trans-Urals Middle and Late Bronze Age House-Building in the Steppe and Forest-Steppe Altai Artistic Metalwork Found Near the Tomskaya Pisanitsa Cultural Ties Across Taiga and Steppe: Material Culture from the Medieval Lower Angara River and Pro Bronze Plaques from Northern Kyrgyzstan with Representations of Horsemen Kimak and Chu-mu-kun 處木昆: Notes on an Identification Traditional Buryat Burials: Changes and Stereotypes Substitute Offering: An Ob Ugrian Ritual Tradition Surviving in the 20th and Early 21st Century Seventeenth Century Siberia as a Land of Opportunity: Social Mobility Among the Russian Pioneers Deciduous Human Teeth from the Upper Paleolithic Site of Yudinovo, Western Russia Realism of Face Depiction in Portraiture   

A Half of a Metal Bipartite Mold of the Seima-Turbino Period
from the Upper Irtysh Region

A.P. Borodovsky

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

We describe a rare find—part of a Middle Bronze Age bipartite metal chill mold from the Upper Irtysh region, used for casting three socketed javelin heads of the Seima-Turbino type. The use of metal molds (chill molds) for bronzecasting is a sophisticated technique, which is rather rare even at the present time. Having originated in the Bronze Age, it was subsequently abandoned for a long time. Chill molds indicate an advanced and efficient bronze-casting. In terms of the gate system, the specimen is a hinged vertically split chill mold. In Eurasia, the technique of casting javelin heads in chill molds was practiced until the Early Iron Age. In Western Siberia, it originated no later than the Middle Bronze Age. At that time, bronze-casting in molds made of metal, stone, clay, or organic materials was highly developed. Apparently, the Upper Irtysh basin, including western Altai, was the region from whence prototypical metal molds had spread and were subsequently replicated in less valuable and less technologically efficient materials such as clay.

Keywords: Upper Irtysh, Seima-Turbino, bronze casting, metal molds (chill molds).