The article is devoted to the attribution of objects from the collection of B. and V. Khanenko, which were received in the 1900s. from the market of antiquities as occurring «from the barrows near the city of Nikopol». These are various applicative decorations mostly dated to the 4th century BC. Stylistic analysis allows us to talk about the heterogeneity of this group of products and with great probability to assume that they are associated with predatory excavations of mounds in the steppe Black Sea region, the Crimea, the forest-steppe Dnieper and Middle Don region. Some of the items probably represent finds in the «royal» burial mounds, which broke out in the second half of the nineteenth century by private collections. All assumptions about the attribution of gold finds from the collection of Khanenko are provisional and based mainly on their iconographic analysis. Further research will undoubtedly help clarify, confirm or disprove the conclusions.
The paper deals to the finds from the barrow near the Shumeiko farm in the Sula river basin (now Sumy region of Ukraine) which was excavated by Sergei Mazaraki in 1899. Objects of Scythian culture were found in the mound: weapons, horse bridles, and vessels. Mikhail Rostovtsev mistakenly attributed to these finds the fragment of ancient Greek kylix of the end of the 6th century BC. Modern researchers date the barrow assemblage near the Shumeiko farm to the first half of the 6th century BC (Igor Bruyako, Denis Grechko, Denis Topal, Oleksandr Shelekhan). Sergey Polin attributes it to Early Scythian time. In the paper three precious items from the barrow are described in detail. This is a sword, the handle of which is plaqued with gold. The ancient craftsman used the granulation technique for decoration. Not only the ancient Greek jewelers used this technique. The masters of Urartu applied it as well. It was used in the decoration of the sword from the Kelermes barrow in the Kuban region, as well as on various adornments. The iron sword has an original shape and belongs to the Shumeiko type (according to Denis Topal, Oleksandr Shelekhan). Such swords were most common in the first half of the 6th century BC. The scabbard was decorated by the gold plate with images of animals and the gold tip. The analysis shows that the images of wild goats and predators are made in the early Scythian animal style. The sheath tip also corresponds to the early Scythian tradition and finds analogies in the Pre-Scythian time. On the contrary, at a later time (the end of the 6th — beginning of the 5th century BC), according to other principles (barrow No 6 near the Oleksandrivka village, Gostra Mogyla near the Tomakovka village) the tips of the scabbard were made. Near the sword the gold plate in the form of a running hare was found. It was made in the Scythian animal style. This plate was probably part of the sheath decor and adorned a side leather ledge that helped to attach the scabbard to the belt. A preliminary conclusion is made about the belonging of precious items from the Shumeiko barrow to the Kelermes horizon of antiquities of the Early Scythian culture.
The article is devoted to the analysis of images on the bone comb from the Haymanova Mohyla mound (IV century BC). The images on it quite fully represent the myth of a Hero fighting a dragon, which is not known from narrative sources. The first large plate (the «male» side of the comb) depicts a battle scene with a consistently developing plot: the defeat of one hero — the triumph of the dragon — revenge and the victory of the second hero. It can be assumed that the characters in this scene are Targitaos and Kolaxais, known from the story of Herodotus. These Scythian heroes relate to Iranian Yima (Jamshid) and Θraētaona (Fereydun). The goddess is reproduced on the second large plate (the «female» side of the comb). Her iconographic image was borrowed from the ancient Greek Art, but it was perceived by the Scythians, probably as the goddess Api (Άπί), equivalent to the Iranian goddess Aredvi Sura Anahita. The general context of the images suggests that the Scythians were familiar with the Iranian prayers to this goddess with a request to bestow good luck in the fight against hostile creatures. The comb was certainly an important ritual and status attribute.
The article is devoted to the analysis of images on a gold pectoral from the Tovsta Mogyla of the middle of the 4th century BC. The product has a well-thought-out structure (fig. 1). The main friezes are the internal and external ones. The central axis on which the most important scenes are located is highlighted. The arrangement of the scenes inside the friezes is subject to pendulum symmetry (fig. 2). The main theme of the external frieze is the death. The central scene embodies the triumph of death, but with each next scene it recedes, and in scenes with a hare and grasshoppers one can watch the transition of the theme to its opposite. The main theme of the internal frieze is life. The development of life is shown through the growth of cubs from the moment of birth to the beginning of adult life. Figures of birds on the frieze edges indicate a change in theme. The story of man, which also has its development, is interwoven into the internal frieze. Its beginning is in the central scene where two men create the clothes from sheep’s clothing. Such clothes in Iranian mythology symbolized the royal khwarrah. It can be assumed that the central characters are the gods who create the royal khwarrah and the happy fate of the future ruler. Such gods could be the Iranian Verethragna and Mithra, corresponding to the Scythian «Ares» and Oitosyros. In the three scenes of the upper frieze the myth about royal power is enclosed. Its main motives are following: predetermining the birth of the king and his happy fate, birth, raising by shepherds, being at the headquarters of the ruler after reaching adulthood and gaining royal power. The appearance of this mythology in the Iranian environment is probably associated with the accession of Cyrus the Great and the Achaemenid dynasty. In the Scythian environment it was called upon to legitimize the power of the ruler-owner of the pectoral. Apparently the myth was a reference to the legendary times of Kolaxais, the ancestor of the Paralates, Scythian warriors and kings. In such a situation the pectoral was conceived as one of the visible incarnations of the royal family khwarrah, telling by means of iconography about its origin.
The paper analyzes the images on the gold gorytos covers of the second half of the 4th century BC (fig. 1). These items were found in the Chertomlyk kurgan (now the Dnipropetrovsk Oblast, Ukraine), the Melitopol kurgan (now the Zaporizhia Oblast, Ukraine), the kurgan near the town of Ilyintssi (now Vinnytsia Oblast, Ukraine) and the kurgan 8 from group of Piat’ bratiev (Five Brothers) near the stanitsa Elizavetinskaya (now the Rostov Oblast, Russia). All gorytos covers are of the same size. They were made using a bronze matrix (or a set of matrices) at the same time and in the same workshop. Most modern researchers accept the interpretation of the central images on the gorytos covers as the scenes from the life of Achilles, the hero of the Greek epic, who was revered by Greeks as divine protector. K. Robert proposed this interpretation in 1891. B. V. Farmakovsky singled out five scenes from the life of Achilles which sequentially represent the Hero from his childhood to the death (fig. 2: 1). In this paper the author identifies nine scenes (fig. 2: 2). Upper frieze: 1) a young man (possibly Apollo) teaches the boy Achilles archery; Thetis stands side by side, she worries about the fate of her son Achilles (fig. 3: 3); 2) Achilles says his mother Thetis goodbye before leaving to the island of Skyros; 3) Odysseus finds Achilles on the island of Skyros; 4) Deidamia, the wife of Achilles, runs away in despair; 5) Peleus hands over his weapon to his son Achilles. Lower frieze: 6) Briseis regrets her fate as a slave (fig. 3: 1—2); 7) Zeus establishes the events in the fates of the heroes (fig. 3: 4); 8) Achilles accepts the gifts from Agamemnon and makes peace with him, a wounded Odysseus is standing beside him; 9) Thetis carries the bag with ashes of Achilles and mourns his death (fig. 3: 5). All scenes tell about the events that preceded the manifestation of Achilles as a great warrior and hero: the beginning of warfare training, the events on the eve of the beginning of the Trojan War, the events at the walls of Troy and the quarrel with Agamemnon. Perhaps these images are associated with the magic of knowledge about the beginning, about the origin. In this case, this is knowledge about the origin of Achilles as a hero. Such magical knowledge made it possible to wield the power of the Protector Hero and direct it to the right direction like a prayer or a spell. Gorytos was the Scythian weapon. This gorytos series was made in some workshop of a Greek city-state, possibly in the Bosporus kingdom. They were donated to the Scythian rulers with a secret purpose: with the help of magical images to restrain the warlike moods of the Scythians, to pacify them. Therefore, these gorytos were like a wooden horse which, according to the Greek epic, the Achaean warriors left as the so-called gift of Troy and with its help captured this impregnable city.
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