Archaeology, Ethnology & Anthropology of Eurasia 53 (2) 2025   doi:10.17746/1563-0110.2025.53.2.025-033

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The Earliest Snake Images in the Middle Irtysh Region

I.V. Schmidt

Dostoevsky Omsk State University, Pr. Mira 55a, Omsk, 644077, Russia

Herpetomorphic images are quite rare in Paleolithic and Mesolithic art. Published bone daggers from Cherno-Ozerye (OMK 9675/702) and Aitkulovo (MAEAAGU OF 93) are the earliest examples of the Middle Irtysh Final Paleolithic or Mesolithic art showing snakes engraved in a stylistically original manner. Both specimens show opposed reptiles striving, as it were, to meet. This plot has so far not been described or geographically localized. An attempt is made to interpret it at least tentatively. It is proposed that people inhabiting southwestern Siberia and the southern Urals in the Final Paleolithic and Mesolithic practiced a snake cult, resulting in amazingly similar works of art. While this region has not been subjected to detailed archaeological studies, examples of early art suggest that it was an ancient cultural province, comparable with that of Malta-Buret, where a search for graphic forms of communication was conducted, special cultural texts were created, and major aspects of worldview were discussed.

Keywords: Southwestern Siberia, Final Paleolithic-Mesolithic, snake images, “opposed snakes striving to meet”, decoration of bone blade items, ancient communicative practices