Ilshat Bakhshiev
Abstract
This article is devoted to analyzing the role of stone as a symbolic substitute for the body of the deceased in the funerary practices of the Srubnaya-Andronovo cultural circle during ...
Read More
This article is devoted to analyzing the role of stone as a symbolic substitute for the body of the deceased in the funerary practices of the Srubnaya-Andronovo cultural circle during the Late Bronze Age in the Southern Urals. The research is based on materials from the Kashkarovsky kurgan burial ground (Bashkir Trans-Urals), particularly Burial 3 of Kurgan 5, where an anthropomorphic stone stele was discovered and interpreted as the central element of a cenotaph. It is suggested that, in this context, the stone fulfilled a certain sacred function and also served as a substitute for the absent body of the deceased. The study presents a typology of similar complexes, distinguishing four groups based on the intentional placement and characteristics of stones in burial pits. Group A includes stele-like stones in burial pits; Group B consists of individual stones deliberately laid at the bottom of the burial pit, sometimes imitating a flexed body position; Groups C and D comprise cenotaphs with several stones or single slabs at the bottom of the grave. The burial pit with a stone stele at the Kashkarovsky burial ground is, in fact, a unique funerary cenotaph complex in which the deliberate placement of a stone at the bottom can be confidently associated with the ritual of substituting for the bodies of the deceased. The limited number of analogies points to the atypical nature of this rite in the funerary practice of the Srubnaya-Andronovo population of the Late Bronze Age Southern Ural forest-steppe. The origin of the tradition remains unclear; however, its connection with the Alakul-Fedorovo funerary traditions of sites in the Southern Urals and Kazakhstan has been identified. Confirmation of this hypothesis requires an expansion of the archaeological source base.
