TheKyiv culture (Ukrainian:Київська культура,romanized: Kyjivsjka kuljtura) orKiev culture (Russian:Киевская культура,romanized: Kievskaja kul'tura) is anarchaeological culture dating from about the 3rd to 5th centuries, named afterKyiv, the capital of Ukraine. It is widely considered to be the first identifiableSlavic archaeological culture.[1] It was located in the "middle and upperDnieper basin, akin to it sites of the type Zaozer´e in the upper Dnieper and the upperDvina basins, and finally the groups of sites of the type Cherepyn–Teremtsy in the upper Dniester basin and of the type Ostrov in thePripyat basin, in Ukraine and Belarus.[1] It was contemporaneous to (and located mostly just to the north of) theChernyakhov culture.
Settlements are found mostly along river banks, frequently either on high cliffs or right by the edge of rivers. The dwellings are overwhelmingly of the semi-subterranean type (common among earlierCeltic andGermanic and later amongSlavic cultures), often square (about four by four meters), with an open hearth in a corner. Most villages consist of just a handful of dwellings. There is very little evidence of the division of labor, although in one case a village belonging to the Kiev culture was preparing thin strips of antlers to be further reworked into the well-known Gothic antler combs, in a nearby Chernyakhov culture village.
The descendants of the Kyiv culture — thePrague-Korchak,Penkovka andKolochin cultures — established in the 5th century in Eastern Europe.[2] There is, however, a substantial disagreement in the scientific community over the identity of the Kyiv culture's predecessors, with some historians and archaeologists tracing it directly from theMilograd culture, others, from theChernoles culture (the Scythian farmers ofHerodotus) through theZarubintsy culture, still others through both thePrzeworsk culture and the Zarubintsy culture.
