Archaeology, Ethnology & Anthropology of Eurasia 48 (2) 2020   DOI: 10.17746/1563-0110.2020.48.2.097-105

Annotation:  A Multidisciplinary Study of Finds from Suchu Island (1973 Season, Excavation II, Dwelling 1) A Zoomorphic Antler Staff from an Early Neolithic Burial at Pushkinsky, the Orenburg Region Cultural Attribution of Early Bronze Age Tombs Under Kurgans in Azerbaijan Two Rare Finds from the Maikop-Novosvobodnaya Sites in the Black Sea Region The Marfa Kurgan in the Stavropol Territory: An Example of an Ancient Architectural Structure On the Earliest Use of Plate-Formed Cheekpieces and the Emergence of Horse Riding (Based on Finds fr Wooden Constructions in Bronze and Iron Age Burials in Japan and Korea The Southeastern Sindica Frontier: The Raevskoye Fortifi ed Settlement Polychrome Style in Mangystau, Kazakhstan Metal Artifacts from a Newly Discovered Cemetery in the Severnaya Sosva Basin, Northwestern Siberia The Ethnoarchaeology of Russians in the Syro-Palestinian Region (18th–19th Centuries) Traditional Buryat Beliefs About Birds Bridal Symbols in the Don Cossack Wedding Celebration of Nowruz in Bukhara and Samarkand in Ritual Practice and Social Discourses (the Second Architectural and Archaeological Studies in the Tobolsk Kremlin During the 1950s (Based on Photograp Trepanations in Sauromato-Sarmatian Crania from the Lower Volga A Case of Surgical Extraction of the Lower Third Molars in a Cranial Series from the Pucara de Tilca   

The Ethnoarchaeology of Russians in the Syro-Palestinian Region
(18th–19th Centuries)

L.A. Belyaev¹ and Y. Tchekhanovets²

¹Institute of Archaeology, Russian Academy of Sciences, Dm. Ulyanova 19, Moscow, 117292, Russia Tomsk State University, Pr. Lenina 34, Tomsk, 634050, Russia

²Israel Antiquities Authority, P.O.B. 586, Jerusalem, 91004, Israel

This study belongs to a new archaeological subdiscipline in Russian and Israeli research—the archaeology of Russian presence, addressing cultural, ethnic, and geopolitical contacts between the Russian Empire and the Near Eastern, specifically Syro-Palestinian, population in the mid-19th to early 20th centuries. This was the time when a new sociocultural entity emerged, known as Russian Palestine. Many thousands of Orthodox Christians from Russia (including Siberia) traveled to the Holy Land each year. A prolonged Russian residence in the Ottoman part of Palestine, where Russia owned dozens of estates, had a profound impact on Palestinian culture. Important evidence thereof are archaeological sites relating to Russian estates and pilgrimage centers. This article provides information on newly discovered Russian estates in 19th century Jerusalem, remains of buildings with their infrastructure at the Russian and Benjamin’s estates, and the Russian Compound outside the Jaffa Gate. Evidence of the Russian presence include numerous 18th-19th century lapidary inscriptions, utensils left by the first Russian missionaries, small cemeteries, and separate burials (some of them very interesting, such as the burial of a Russian pilgrim at Aceldama, Jerusalem). One find is unusual—a family synodikon from Aceldama, printed in Moscow. Among the inscriptions are professional ones, made in the monumental style, and usual prayer graffiti. One inscription has allowed us to determine the date of the pilgrimage to Constantinople and Palestine by the Chernigov monks, described by Sylvester (Dikansky).

Keywords: Historical archaeology, pilgrimage, cemeteries, Jerusalem, Jericho, cultural contacts