Archaeology, Ethnology & Anthropology of Eurasia 54 (2) 2026   doi:10.17746/1563-0110.2026.54.2.120-126

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Late 18th to Early 19th Century Representations of Armed Horsemen
on Northern Khanty Ritual Artifacts

A.P. Borodovsky and A.V. Baulo

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

We describe representations of mounted warriors on ritual artifacts (silver plates and a leather pouch), used in ritual practices of the Khanty on the Lower Ob, and propose their chronological attribution and interpretation. A comparative analysis reveals the prototypes and dates of these representations and their connection with late 18th to early 19th century decorative traditions. Silver saucers with figures of horsemen wearing helmets were made at P.T. Bryukhanov's workshop in Tobolsk. This military headgear resembles leather helmets of the Tarleton type with longitudinal fur crests, popular during a rather short period from the American Revolutionary War (1775-1783) to the Napoleonic Wars (1795-1815). We provide a detailed description of the leather pouch with figures of a hussar and his horse (replicating an unknown engraving from the first quarter of the 19th century), and a fragment of Konstantin Batyushkov's poem “The Farewell”, whose motifs and popularity were closely related to 1813-1814 foreign campaigns by the Russian army. We conclude that representations on artifacts manufactured for the Voguls and Ostyaks were rather realistic, and reproduced characteristic details of that time.

Keywords: Khanty, silver, saucers, pouch, mounted warriors, Tarleton helmet