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| Geographical range | MiddleVolga and the southernUrals |
|---|---|
| Period | Bronze Age |
| Dates | c. 2200 – 1850 BC |
| Type site | Abashevo |
| Preceded by | Fatyanovo–Balanovo culture,Corded Ware,Poltavka culture,Catacomb culture,Volosovo culture |
| Followed by | Sintashta culture,Potapovka culture,Srubnaya culture |
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TheAbashevo culture (Russian:Абашевская культура,romanized: Abashevskaya kul'tura) is a late MiddleBronze Agearchaeological culture, ca. 2200–1850 BC,[1] found in the valleys of the middleVolga andKama River north of theSamara bend and into the southernUral Mountains. It receives its name from the village ofAbashevo inChuvashia.
Tracing its origins in theFatyanovo–Balanovo culture, an eastern offshoot of theCorded Ware culture ofCentral Europe, the Abashevo culture is notable for its metallurgical activity and evidence for the use of chariots in its end phase.[2][3] It eventually came to absorb theVolosovo culture. The Abashevo culture is often viewed as pre-Indo-Iranian-speaking orProto-Indo-Iranian-speaking. It played a major role in the development of theSintashta culture andSrubnaya culture.[4]
The Abashevo culture is believed to have formed on the northernDon in the early 3rd millennium BC.[5] It occupied part of the area of the earlierFatyanovo–Balanovo culture, the eastern variant of the earlierCorded Ware culture.[6][7]
The genetics of Abashevo are distinct from those of the Corded Ware people further west. While both share the R1a Y Haplogroup, Abashevo is the R1a-Z92-93 clade while CWC is an older subclade not ancestral to the one found in Abashevo.[citation needed]
Influences from the Yamnaya culture and Catacomb culture on the Abashevo culture are detected.[5] The pre-eminent expert on the Abashevo culture,Anatoly Pryakhin, concluded that it originated from contacts between Fatyanovo–Balanovo,Catacomb andPoltavka peoples in the southern forest-steppe.[6] The influence of the Yamnaya culture persisted until approximately 1700 BC with the emergence of new technologies, traditions, and customs.[8]
The Abashevo culture represents an extension of steppe culture into the forest zone.[6]
The Abashevo culture flourished in theforest steppe areas of the middleVolga and upper Don.[6] The sites were represented largely by kurgan cemeteries and some areas with evidence of copper smelting.[9] A few settlements extended in the northern steppes of the middle Volga.[9]
The Abashevo culture appears to have absorbed parts of theVolosovo culture. Contacts with the Volosovo culture appears to have facilitated the spread of pastoralism and metallurgy into northern forest cultures.[6]
The easternmost sites of the Abashevo culture are located along the southernUrals. Those sites are associated with the origins of theSintashta culture.[6] The Abashevo culture is divided into a Don-Volga variant, a middle Volga variant and a southern Ural variant.[10] On the northern Don, the Abashevo culture replaced the Catacomb culture.[11] Along the middle Volga, it co-existed with the Poltavka culture.[11]
Elena E. Kuzmina suggests that theSeima-Turbino phenomenon emerged as a result of interaction between the Abashevo culture, the Catacomb culture and the early Andronovo culture.[12]
Thetype site of the Abashevo culture is atAbashevo, Chuvash Republic. More than two hundred settlements have been found. Some of them appear to have been occupied only briefly, and just two of them appear to have been fortified.[6]
The Abashevo culture is primarily represented by variouskurgan cemeteries. Kurgans were surrounded by a circular ditch, and the grave pit had ledges at its edges. The body was either contracted on the side, or supine with raised knees, with legs flexed. Its funerary customs appear to have been derived from the Poltavka culture.[6] Itsinhumation practices intumuli are similar to theYamnaya culture[10] and Fatyanovo–Balanovo culture.[15]
Flat graves are a component of the Abashevo culture burial rite,[16] as in the earlier Fatyanovo culture.[15] The kurgans of the Abashevo culture are to be distinguished from the flat graves of the Fatyanovo–Balanovo culture.[6] A well-known Abashevo kurgan inPepkino contained the remains of twenty-eight males who appear to have died violent deaths.[10]
Grave offerings are scant, little more than a pot or two usually made with crushed-shell temper. Some graves show evidence of a birch bark floor and a timber construction forming walls and roof.[10] High-status Abashevo graves contain silver and copper ornaments, and weapons.[6] Crucibles for smelting copper and moulds for casting were found in some graves, most likely funerals reserved to bronzesmiths.[10]
High-status Abashevo women are notable for wearing a distinctive type of headband with pendants made of copper and silver. These headbands are unique to the Abashevo culture, and are probably an ethnic marker and symbol of political status.[10][6]
The diadems of the Abashevo women are very similar to those of elite women inMycenaean Greece.[17]Elena Efimovna Kuzmina cites this as evidence of cultural synchronization between these ancient cultures.[17]
Abashevo ceramics display influences from the Catacomb culture, which was located further south. Its ceramics in turn influence those of the Sintashta culture.[18]
The Abashevo culture was an important center of metallurgy, as the southern Urals provided a major source of local copper.[10] There is evidence of copper smelting, and the culture engaged in copper mining activities,[6] which stimulated the formation of Sintashta metallurgy.[19]
About half of Abashevo metal objects are of copper, while the other half is of bronze.[6] Silver-bearing ores were also extracted, from which silver ornaments were made.[10] Abashevo metal types, such as knives were very similar to those of the Catacomb culture and the Poltavka culture.[6]
The economy of the Abashevo culture was mixed agriculture. Cattle, sheep, pig and goats, as well as other domestic animals were kept. Stone grinders and metal sickles are evidences of agriculture.[10]
Horses were evidently used, inferred by cheek pieces typical of neighboring steppe cultures and Mycenaean Greece.[20][21] According to Elena Kuzmina (2007) the first controlling of chariots with cheek-pieces can be attributed to the Abashevo andMulti-cordoned ware cultures.[22][23]
The population of Sintashta derived their stock-breeding from Abashevo. Abashevo cattle was of theUkrainian Grey type, and this cattle had previously been raised among earlier Neolithic cultures of thePontic steppe and along theDanube. This type of cattle was later adopted by the Sintashta culture and the Srubnaya culture.[24]
Archaeological evidence suggests that Abashevo society was intensely warlike. Mass graves reveal that inter-tribal battles involved hundreds of warriors of both sides, which indicates a significant degree of inter-regional political integration. Warfare appears to have been more frequent in the late Abashevo period, and it was in this turbulent environment in which the Sintashta culture emerged.[6]
David Anthony assumes that the Abashevo people spoke Pre-Indo-Iranian orProto-Indo-Iranian, since it is a possible source of Indo-Iranian loanwords inUralic.[6] The Indo-Iranian characteristic of the Abashevo language is also evidenced in its loanwords in Finnic and Saami.[25]
It probably witnessed a bilingual population undergo a process of assimilation.[11]
Physical remains of the Abashevo people has revealed that they wereCaucasoids/Europoids withdolichocephalic skulls.[26] Abashevo skulls are very similar to those of the precedingFatyanovo–Balanovo culture,[26] and the succeedingSintashta culture,Andronovo culture andSrubnaya culture, while differing from those of theYamnaya culture,Poltavka culture,Catacomb culture andPotapovka culture, which although being of a similar robustEuropoid type, are less dolichocephalic. The physical type of Abashevo, Sintashta, Andronovo and Srubnaya is later observed among theScythians.[a][b]
The Abashevo culture is closely associated with theSintashta culture,[29] and must have played a role in its origin.[6][30] The Sintashta culture however differs from the Abashevo culture through having fortified settlements, conducting large-scale animal sacrifices, and in its metal types and ornaments.[31]
Continuity between the Abashevo culture and the laterSrubnaya culture has been pointed out.[32][33] Along with the Potapovka culture,[34] the Abashevo culture is considered an ancestor of the Srubnaya culture.[10][35] The Potapovka culture itself emerged from the Poltavka culture with influences from the Abashevo culture.[35]
| Bronze Age |
|---|
| ↑Chalcolithic |
East Asia(c. 3100–300 BC) |
Eurasia and Siberia(c. 2700–700 BC) |
Europe(c. 3200–900 BC) Aegean (Cycladic,Minoan,Mycenaean),Caucasus,Catacomb culture,Srubnaya culture,Bell Beaker culture,Apennine culture,Terramare culture,Únětice culture,Tumulus culture,Urnfield culture,Proto-Villanovan culture,Hallstatt culture,Canegrate culture,Golasecca culture,Argaric culture,Atlantic Bronze Age,Bronze Age Britain,Nordic Bronze Age |
| ↓Iron Age |
The Sintashta Culture, located in the Trans-Urals, represents the earliest, fully-developed, chariot-using Bronze Age culture... West of the Urals, stretching through the forest-steppe zone into Eastern Europe we find a related sister culture, called the Abashevo Culture, which also relied on chariots.
In the Don–Volga interfluve, the latest variant of Abashevo is often referred to as the Pokrovka type ... The Abashevo culture and the Pokrovka type are often seen as, respectively, the formative and terminal periods of the same cultural complex, which is, in general, the continuation of the Corded Ware culture ... Pokrovka graves provide notable but indirect evidence of wide utilization of wheeled transport. Bones of domesticated horse are found in both burial and domestic contexts, which suggests that the horse was a draft animal. More direct evidence is provided by the studded elk-antler cheekpieces—the earliest artifacts of this kind in Eastern Europe ... In sum, the Pokrovka phenomenon is often seen as an important part of the 'chariot horizon', which represents a rapid extension of the chariot complex to the vast areas of Northern Eurasia. ... chariot technology likely developed before the year 2000 BC in the Sintashta homeland, which is the Don–Volga interfluve … Thus, they were invented in the context of the pre-Sintashta cultures and fully developed during the Sintashta period.
The Sintashta Culture, located in the Trans-Urals, represents the earliest, fully-developed, chariot-using Bronze Age culture... West of the Urals, stretching through the forest-steppe zone into Eastern Europe we find a related sister culture, called the Abashevo Culture, which also relied on chariots.