Archaeology, Ethnology & Anthropology of Eurasia 47 (1) 2019   DOI: 10.17746/1563-0110.2019.47.1.113-118

Annotation:  The Loess-Paleosol Sequence at the Krasnogorskoye Section, the Low-Hill Zone of the Northeastern Alt The Early Neolithic Complex on the Tartas-1 Site: Results of the AMS Radiocarbon Dating Water and Cosmology in the Stone Age of Northeastern Europe Turning Points in Horse Breeding in the Eurasian Steppes and the Near East The Study of Middle Bronze Age Interments at Khanghah Gilavan: Tentative Results The Petrovka Bronze Age Sites: Issues in Taxonomy and Chronology A Comparative Study of the Layout of Bronze Age Fortifi ed Settlements in the Southern Urals (3rd to Early Iron Age Pyramidal Kurgans in Western Siberia The Xiongnu Gold from Noin-Ula (Mongolia) Geophysical Studies at the Horogoru Fortifi ed Settlement in South Korea Medieval Sites of Tara Region, the Irtysh Basin: Origin, Chronology, Cultural and Ethnic Attribution A Central Asian Helmet from the Northern Kazakhstan Regional Museum The 18th-Century Udmurt Women’s Outfi ts Depicted in J.P. Falk’s Book: Interpretation and Attributio Wearing Folk Costumes as a Mimetic Practice in Russian Ethnographic Field Studies Types of Winter Clothing Worn by Descendants of the Russian Pioneers in Siberia (Late 19th to Early Long-Bone Growth in the Bronze Age Skeletal Population of Gonur-Depe, Turkmenistan   

A Central Asian Helmet
from the Northern Kazakhstan Regional Museum

L.A. Bobrov and D.M. Ismailov

Novosibirsk State University, Pirogova 1, Novosibirsk, 630090, Russia

We describe a richly decorated iron helmet owned by the Northern Kazakhstan Regional Museum in Petropavlovsk. It consists of a low solid hemispherical crown, a slightly convex plate, made of copper alloy, with an opening for a (missing) tube in which the plume was inserted, a wide iron hoop, and a bipartite visor of the box type. The two last-named elements are covered with Arabic inscriptions inlaid in gold. Those on the hoop are verses from the Quran 2, 255-257, Al-Baqarah—The Cow. That on the “shield” of the visor is a prayer for protection, known as the “message of peace” read before a long journey or a difficult and dangerous enterprise, such as a battle. Such helmets were common in Central Asia between the late 16th and the mid-18th centuries. This specimen was likely manufactured in Mawarannahr, Xinjiang, or some town on the Syr Darya, for a high-ranking Uzbek, Uyghur, or Kazakh warrior. This accounts for the combination of a solid crown and a hoop with Arabic inscriptions with a box-type visor typical of helmets worn by Mongolian and Turkic nomads during the Late Middle Ages and the Early Modern Age. The closest parallels are found in the museums of Kazakhstan. Judging by the traces of repair and reconstruction, this helmet was used for a long time.

Keywords: Central Asia, Kazakhstan, Mawarannahr, armor, helmet