Genesis of the Tagar Culture Based on Dental Anthropology
Year: 2025
Type: article
Abstract: The Tagar culture people used to live in the Southern Siberia (nowadays, Krasnoyarsk Krai, the Republic of Khakassia, Kemerovo Region) in the 1st millennium BC. Most researchers attribute the Early Tagar era to 700s BC; while the Late Tagar era is attributed to either the 200s BC or even the 100s AD. There are disputes if the Tes Stage is the finale. There is a long history of studying the Tagar culture people anthropological peculiarities. However, studies of their dental morphology are scarce. Such studies cover only cemeteries in the Minusinsk Basin. This paper reviews main hypotheses of how the Tagar culture anthropology formed. The article publishes new dental anthropological data of the early (Podgornovo) and the final (Tes) stages in the Nazarovo and Minusinsk Basins. The materials discussed in the article originate from cemeteries Sopka-I, Koshkol, Temra (Sharypovskiy District, Krasnoyarsk Krai) and Smirnovka-4 (underground and mound burials; Beyskiy District, the Republic of Khakassia). In total, the research covers 155 individuals. The territorial and chronological changes in the dental anthropological characteristics were analysed for the Tagar people. The findings reveal they are obviously heterogeneous. The early-stage series feature more frequent oriental dental anthropological phenes which disappear as the final Tes period approaches. At the same time, the studied groups are similar in terms of western dental anthropological traits. This allows to distinguish a common western substrate for all series in question. The conducted study allows to relate the Tes people to the Eastern European population. Roots of these relations date back to the Bronze Age. The obtained picture of inter-population contacts matches the findings of the mt DNA analysis. This analysis shows that the Tes series is found among the western steppe strip communities and totally comprised with components of the western Eurasian origin. According to the dental anthropological data and according to the craniometric analysis, the Karasuk people were not involved in the genesis of the ‘Tagars’.
Source: Ufa Archaeological Herald
Authors: Polina V. Vykochko, Natalya A. Leibova
Language: English
Subfield: Archeology (arts and humanities)
Field: Arts and Humanities
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: diamond
OpenAlex ID: W7219050087