Archaeology, Ethnology & Anthropology of Eurasia 46 (4) 2018   DOI: 10.17746/1563-0110.2018.46.4.140-148

Annotation:  Ivory Figurines and the Symbolic Context of a Paleolithic Dwelling at Kovrizhka IV on the Lower Viti On the Interpretation of Stelae in the Cult Complexes of Northern Mesopotamia During the Pre-Pottery A Study of Finds from Excavation I at Suchu Island, the Lower Amur (the 1974 Field Season) Jade Artifacts from Bronze Age Cemeteries in the Cis-Olkhon Area, the Western Coast of Lake Baikal Sherubai-1: An Andronovo (Fedorovka) Cemetery in Central Kazakhstan Technologies Involved in Manufacturing Wooden Horns for the Ceremonial Masks of Horses from the Pazy On the Time and Context of the Earliest Bronze Mirrors in the Northern Pontic Region Procession of Horsemen on a Gold Plaque from the Siberian Collection of Peter I A Mongolian Era Female Headdress from the Upper Ob Basin Ancient Irrigated Soils of the Bozok Archaeological District, Northern Kazakhstan (11th to 12th Cent Chthonic Animals in the Traditional Buryat Culture Reconstruction of Wooden and Earthen Buildings in 17th to 18th-Century Russian Forts in Siberia: The Application of the Blue-Intensity Method for Dating Wooden Buildings in Siberia The Eastern Slavic Population of Central Asia After the Collapse of the USSR: Ethno-Demographic Proc An Unusual Burial of a Xiongnu-Sarmatian Era Warrior in the Western Siberian Forest-Steppe: Results Armed Violence Among the Altai Mountains Pastoralists of the Xiongnu-Sarmatian Age “Abandoned, Tied, Flexed”: An Anthropological Study of an Unusual Late Sarmatian Burial in the South   

“Abandoned, Tied, Flexed”: An Anthropological Study
of an Unusual Late Sarmatian Burial in the Southeastern Urals

V.K. Fedorov¹, A.I. Nechvaloda², and Y.V. Rafikova²

¹Eastern Academy of Economics, Law and Humanities (VEGU Academy), Mendeleeva 215/4, Ufa, 450071, Russia

²Institute of History, Language and Literature, Ufa Scientifi c Center, Russian Academy of Sciences, Pr. Oktyabrya 71, Ufa, 450054, Russia

We describe an unusual triple burial in southern Bashkiria, dating to 100-400 AD. Its peculiarity is that the two males had been buried on the step of the entrance pit in unusual postures—prone with their knees pulled to their chins. A woman buried in the niche lay in a normal (supine) posture. A prone position of the dead is quite rare at Late Sarmatian cemeteries, and flexed burials are exceptional. The anthropological examination revealed that the physical types of the buried persons were different: while all of them were narrow-faced Caucasoids, the features of one male, unlike those of other persons, indicate a Mongoloid admixture. All the individuals are similar to those buried at Pokrovka-10, a Late Sarmatian cemetery in the Orenburg Region. Graphical reconstructions of the appearance of one male and the woman were made. The postcranial skeletons of all the individuals reveal multiple pathologies. To explain the unusual burial rite, we discuss various possibilities, such as that the bodies of the males had been tied up to counter the evil that they might inflict; that they had been sacrificed; or that they all had died of a fulminant infectious disease. The uniqueness of the burial prevents us from selecting one of these options. The humble status of the males may illustrate the words of Ammianus Marcellinus about the maltreatment of the elderly among the Alans.

Keywords: Late Sarmatians, burial rite, craniology, paleopathology, flexed burials, sacrifice