Cultural & Household Complex of Livestock Farmers in the Medieval Southern Urals
Year: 2025
Type: article
Abstract: The article is dedicated to the cultural & household complex of livestock farmers in the Medieval Southern Urals (800s–1300s). There is little to no research of nomadic and seminomadic stationary settlements in the Southern Urals steppe. It is associated with virgin land total development in 1950s–1960s. It is less ap- plicable to the late Medieval forest-steppe settlements and hillforts (dated 1200s–1800s) (Chiyalik culture and Yudino culture, Makushino cultural type), as well as Golden Horde times and Ulus Shibana hillforts (Saray-Jük, Zhaik, Isker, Chingi, Tura, etc.). However, materials from these settlements and hillforts do not throw an exhaus-tive light over the nature of the entire cultural & household complex with its seasons and territorial preferences. Therefore, the most relevant materials are still burials and sacrifice & commemoration sites, their cartography and contents. The household complex in the 800s–1000s Southern Transurals forest-steppe belongs to semino- madic people and is associated with the seasonal cycle. The complex includes stationary villages (yorts) situated in large steppe micro districts with water bodies (lakes, swamps). These areas fit for livestock wintering. Summer camps used to lay in the mountain forests of the Ural range eastern slopes. Summer camps here are evident of heteroge-neous burial sites. Materials from them have a typology similar to artifacts from 800s–1000s Transural forest steppe necropoleis. The next stage of changes in the household life (900s – early 1200s) is associated with Kypchak influence in the Urals. Dasht-i-Qipchaq and Polovtsian steppes appeared and caused Aral-Ural nomadic cycle resumption. Sites of this stage are standalone kurgans scattered across the basin of the Ural River and its tributaries. The Mongolian invasion and the Ulus system significantly reshaped the map of Bashkir tribes’ habitats in the Southern Urals. The Kypchak migration solidified the boundary between the nomadic and semi- nomadic peoples in the Southern Urals.
Source: Ufa Archaeological Herald
Authors: Sergei G. Botalov, Alexander D. Tairov
Language: English
Subfield: Archeology
Field: Arts and Humanities
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: diamond
OpenAlex ID: W7115189516