Im(mobile) Pastoralists of the Central Steppes? Ethnohistory vs. Archaeology

Summary

This is an abstract from the "Steppe by Steppe: Advances in the Archaeology of Eastern Eurasia" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Due to the heavy influence of sixteenth- to nineteenth-century ethnography, many researchers still consider the Late Bronze Age (LBA) (2100–1300 BC) populations of the Trans-Ural steppe/forest-steppe to be nomadic pastoralists—a situation where most or all of human population is involved in periodic movements between pastures. However, a comprehensive synthesis of data pertaining to settlement architecture, garbage accumulation rates, herd composition, osteological seasonality markers, stable isotopes, the degree of transportability of artifacts, and haymaking activities from 42 archaeological sites points to the fact that the settlements of the Sintashta, Petrovka, Alakul, and Srubno-Alakul cultural types were sedentary; i.e., occupied year-round by at least a portion of the population. This observation, among other things, indicates that the analysis of the LBA populations of the central steppes requires no special approaches that would account for community-level seasonal mobility, thereby opening up the possibilities for focusing on some of the previously understudied aspects of LBA regional demography. In addition, the above finding adds the Trans-Urals to the list of world regions where large-scale sedentism preceded crop cultivation.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Steppe by Steppe: Advances in the Archaeology of Eastern Eurasia   •
• Society for American Archaeology 89th Annual Meeting, New Orleans, LA (2024)

Keywords

Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 38536.0