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Review Article

Late prehistoric exploitation of the Eurasian steppe. By Marsha
Levine, Yuri Rassamakin, Aleksandr Kislenko and Nataliya Tatarintseva
with an introduction by Colin Renfrew. Cambridge, England: McDonald
Institute for Archaeological Research. 224pp.; 132 figures; 23 tables.

Distributed by Oxbow Books (United Kingdom), and The David Brown Book
Company, P.O. Box 511, Oakville, CT (USA). Tele: 800-791-9354. 

e-mail: david.brown.bk.co at snet.net

[1][LINK] 

M. Levine (Chapter 2), Y. Rassamakin (Chapter 3), and A. Kislenko and
N. Tatarintseva (Chapter 4) present their individual current research
examining the use of steppe lands and the impact of their populations
upon each other. Using archaeological evidence from previous
excavations, the authors address topics that have for decades
confronted and confused archaeological interpretations of the Eurasian
steppes (and still do). Foremost under consideration are assumptions
concerning the domestication of the horse, the realities of warrior
invasions from the east, and the emergence of a true mobile
pastoralism. Colin Renfrew notes in the introduction that although the
Eurasian steppes witnessed the development of several distinct
language groups including Turkic, Mongolian and Tungus as well as
Uralic, it is theories surrounding the origin of Indo-European family
groups that predominantly influence steppe archaeological
interpretations. The authors have widened the debate and have drawn
new conclusions after reviewing existing archaeological data. Because
of its content, I have reviewed each chapter as a separate entity.
Throughout the book inconsistency exists in the naming of time periods
in the texts and on the charts/maps, a relatively simple matter that
could have been rectified by a copy editor, an inexplicable omission
in this day of computers. Romanian site names are inconsistent,
another copy editing problem. Comparing locales and sites discussed
throughout chapters would have been facilitated if there had been an
index covering the entire volume.

Chapter 2. "The Origins of Horse Husbandry on the Eurasian Steppe" by
Marsha Levine (53pp.; 3.5p. bibliography).

[2][LINK] 

Map. Locations of Erh-shih and Ch'ang-n, Dereivka, Molyukov Bugor and Botai

Levine's study centers on horse husbandy in the Eurasian steppes. She
provides a variety of useful charts and data tables that note, for
example, tooth-size and other equine comparative data during the
Paleolithic Period; at Dereivka (Eneolithic in the Ukraine); Botai
(Eneolithic in northcentral Kazakhstan); and Thornhill Farm (an Iron
Age early Roman settlement in Gloucestershire where horses were ridden
but not eaten). One especially interesting fact she notes is that
during early prehistoric stages, the horse was more valuable as a food
than for transport for its meat and milk are unusually high in
amino-acids, minerals, and vitamins essential to the development of
the nervous and vascular systems. (This also explains the Kazak's
dependency on kumiss, fermented mare's milk, and why they eat
horsemeat especially during the harsh winter.) Citing "false-direct"
evidence used as direct evidence, Levine debunks the warrior Kurgan
Culture theory by suggesting that artifacts identified as "horse-head
scepters or maces" were not symbols of power (as previously noted) and
have never been found with any direct or indirect evidence to indicate
horse domestication or horse-riding. It is cattle (oxen?) heads
(excavated crania), not horses that accompanied wagons in the burials
that date 3000 and 2500 BC, and horse bones occasionally found in
context with Eneolithic and Early Bronze Age human remains attest to a
symbolic association, not domestication.

Indicating that the Dereivka horse domestication is flawed because of
the same methodological inadequacies of "false-direct," Levine
reconsiders the "Dereivka Myth," and concludes that the hypothesis
that horse domestication spread from west to east, i.e., from Dereivka
to Botai, is erroneous. Recent excavation from Molyukhov Bugor, a
later-dated Dereivka culture site, provided a taxon list similar to
that of Dereivka (cattle and pig bones [18.5% of the mammal bones]
bones were discarded before a systematic study was completed).
Tentative studies on Molyukhov Bugor taxon indicate the Dereivka
culture people were hunter-gathers and perhaps small-scale
agriculturists (p.17); they were not pastoralists who had taken up
riding horses they had domesticated.

To better understand horse breeding and to provide data for seven
models the author constructed, Levine cites oral histories she has
gathered from five steppe nomads between 1989 and 1992. Using these
data (a very minimal sample taken from two cultures over a wide
geographic area) she compares the models and, in this light, reviews
Dereivka and Botai horse bones and teeth. She concludes that the
Dereivka horses, because of the small settlement size, the faunal
assemblage, and the age and sex of the animals when killed, belong to
her Stalking Model. This is a selective hunting technique, in which
wild horses were stalked and killed, one at a time, with bow and arrow
or spear. In contrast, Botai with its large population and immense
quantity of horse bones is a better paradigm for the Herd Driving
Model, a non-selective hunting technique that requires large-scale
human cooperation and seasonal animal aggregation (p.43). She again
concludes that at least the vast majority of the horses from Dereivka
and Botai were wild and were killed in the hunt.

Other new studies develop collaboration between archaeologists and
veterinarians to determine through analyses of their skeletons if
horses were ridden, used in traction, or neither. A large assemblage
of modern pathological material from known horses reveals that work
related injuries occur on the foot bones, the hip, the shoulder and
thoracic vertebrae. In the archaeological realm, riding injuries are
noted on the small sample of horse skeletal material from Ak-alakha,
the Ukok highland kurgans excavated in 1995 by N. Polosmak. However,
Mongolian and Kazak saddles, in which the rider's weight rests on the
rib cage and not the thoracic spine, could alleviate riding injuries
and therefore could skew data. The author notes that although skeletal
material from Dereivka was discarded, an enormous quantity remains at
Botai and that skeletal pathological studies could clarify this
question.

Levine concludes that we still do not know when or where the horse was
first domesticated and, moreover, no single study (population
structure, pleopathology, bit wear, taphonomy, etc.) can be
conclusive. However, new studies such as table isotopes could indicate
the composition of human and animal diets; data that could be
enlightening.

Levine has erroneously stated several details: Mongols lived in felt
tents known as yurts (p. 21); nomadic Kazaks live in yurts while
Mongols live in gers. An aul is not a permanent dwelling (p. 22); it
is a small "village" of yurts that Kazaks live in during the migratory
period, such as at summer pasture. The Ukok plateau is not the
southernmost part of the Altai Mountains (p. 46); it is the
southernmost part of the Altai Mountains in the Russian republic as
the high Altai Mountains continue south through the Bayan Ulgii and
Uvs aimags of western Mongolia. Some of Levine's data appear
inconclusive and/or premature, particularly the oral history on horse
breeding among the Kazak and Mongols (sample too small). The concept
of collaboration between veterinarians and archaeologists to better
understand skeletal work-related injuries does, however, appear to be
an excellent idea.

Ch. 3. "The Eneolithic of the Black Sea Steppe: Dynamics of Cultural
and Economic Development 4500-2300 BC," by Yuri Rassamakin. Sarah
Wright, Tr. (123pp.; 15pp.C14 dates; 9pp. bibliography)

[3][LINK] 

Lower Mikhailovka culture (?): complex from Novonikolaevka, Kurgan 7, Burial
6

Rassamakin's is by far the longest essay and is divided into three
parts. Part I is complex but significant inasmuch as he briefly
reviews the major historiography models for the development of the
Eneolithic and Early Bronze Age in Eastern Europe proposed in the last
45 years (e.g., Gimbutas, Merpert, Danilenko, Telegin, Shaposhnikova,
and Vasilev-Sinyuk). Lesser-known Eneolithic and Early Bronze
cultures, such as Repin, Pivikha, and Kvityana in the north Black Sea
steppes, extending into the forest-steppes, are included as well as
the better known Maikop and Deirevka cultures. Four good maps,
necessary to follow the development and migrations of these cultures,
are included. For example, during the Early Eneolithic, the
Cucuteni-Tripolye culture is seen in relation to Varna, located to the
southwest, as well as to the lesser-known, but much more encompassing
Skelya culture that occupied the Dnieper-Don interfluve to the east.

In Part I, Rassamakin discusses in more detail the errors and/or
deficiencies of the previous models by comparing and noting elements
that have prevented the models from being generally accepted. As
examples, data used by Danilenko have not been corroborated by further
research, while Telgrin's model constructed along more traditional
lines still raises unanswerable questions. One primary issue that
disturbs Rassamakin is: "why was a single Sredny Stog culture created
from the outset on the sole basis of an outward similarity in ceramic
assemblages?" (p. 69). The author notes that researchers created the
Sredny Stog culture by a reverse process: first, the unity was
postulated on the basis of external generalities, then the sites
included in the culture were analyzed. He notes that even the pottery
lacks unity, yet the differences were disregarded as merely local or
chronological varieties. Shaposhnikova, in her model, takes on the
argument by pointing out that "regional variations" were actually
chronological differences. Rassamakin's summation of Part I indicates
he finds no grounds to claim an eastern origin for the Pontic steppe
Eneolithic cultures and economies. Nor did they have nomadic or
exclusively horse-riding characteristics.

In Part II, Rassamakin begins by noting that he has reviewed the last
forty years of archaeological endeavors. As he began to construct a
new model for the development of the Pontic Eneolithic, he developed a
new classification for all known Eneolithic flat and kurgan burial
sites based on four burial traditions using skeletal orientation and
position as criteria. Associating key settlement ceramic assemblages
of diagnostic types chosen from well-known archaeological cultures
(Skelya, Kvityana, Dereivka, Lower Mikhailovka, and
Zhivotilovo-Volchanskoe) with burial assemblages, he concludes that
his groupings are considerably different from those of the previous
models analyzed in Part I. Thus, he reorganizes the periodization of
these four cultures in relation to each other and to neighboring
cultures in the steppes, steppe-forest, and forest-steppe zones. From
this reorganization he divides the Eneolithic into three periods,
Early, Middle, and Late and Final, then analyzes the cultures and
cultural relationships that fit into his periodization. His
discussions are extensive and only the most salient points can be
noted here

Early Eneolithic (ca.4550 [?] - 4100.4000 BC). In the Early Eneolithic
the driving economic force in the Black Sea steppe region was the
integration of the Skelya culture elite into the southeastern European
prestige exchange system (mainly copper and copper artifacts but also
flint and obsidian) as reflected in the Varna cemetery. Skelya pottery
is analogous with the earliest domestic Cucuteni-Tripolye pottery. The
far-eastern boundary of the trade-exchange network is located in the
north Caspian Khvalynsk sites. Skelya prestige items also were traded
along the Don to the Kuban and into the Caucasian foothills with the
key site being Svobodnoe. (Fig 3.42 schematically illustrates the
dynamics of the elite trade system.) The earliest kurgan-type burials
appear in the Skelya cultural region. Rassamakin posits that the Early
Eneolithic saw the " the emergence of a mutually beneficial system of
exchange between the steppe populations and the production centers of
the agricultural world" (p. 112)Ðthe closest being the
Cucuteni-Tripolye and the furthest Varna. Thus, he precludes any
advance of a first wave of warlike kurgan people coming from the Volga
or Caspian.

Middle Eneolithic (3800 (3700) - 3500/3400 BC). Following an
unexplained "Steppe Hiatus (4100 [4000] - 3800 [3700]), the Middle
Eneolithic emerged under the pressure of strong Cucuteni-Tripolye
B2-C1 influence. However, the Cucuteni-Tripolye world had become
disunited creating an eastern-western split. With diminished power the
eastern segment migrated from the middle Dnieper to the southern Bug
where their influence was most notable along the north Black Sea
littoral and it is here that the Lower Mikhailovka culture developed.
The rise of the archaic Kvityana (south of the Dereivka culture along
the Dnieper), according to Rassamakin, was influenced by Sredny Stog
II as noted in pottery compositional and technical parallels. Based on
pottery tradition, the Dereivka culture appears to have developed from
a transformation of some (unnamed) Neolithic forest-steppe tribe. The
author notes that the chronology and periodization of Dereivka is
difficult to determine as the pottery reflects both Tripolye B2 / C-1
and C2, although one scholar (Movsha) believes that Dereivka is
contemporary only with C2. The Repin culture, with pottery similar to
that of Sredny Stog II, developed on the middle Don. The
Konstantinovka culture, located along the lower Don and in the Azov
steppes, and predominately known by its prestige kurgans, derived from
the Maikop culture. Thus, the Middle Eneolithic is notable for the
development of a number of independent cultures (Kvityana, Repin,
Konstantinovka, and to some extent Dereivka, Cernavoda, and Lower
Mikhailovka) in the area previously occupied by the Skelya horizon.
The predominant influence on these cultures was the Tripolye people
with a secondary Maikop connection in the lower Don. The Volga
remained on the periphery without any large-scale migration through
the Pontic steppes.

Late Phase and Final Eneolithic (3500/3400 BC - ca. 3000/2900 (?) BC).
Again Tripolye, this time phase C2, plays the most active role during
a period noted for cultural breakup. Along the Dniester, the
Vykhvatinsk, located to the south the Usatova culture, formed while
Lower Mikhailovka remained intact. Tripolye influence increased on the
Dereivka peoples. The final stage of this period (some scholars
consider the time frame as the beginning of the Early Bronze Age)
witnessed two migrations. First, a southerly migration by Late
Tripolye forest-steppe peoplesÐtribes termed Kasperovo by Movsha and
Gordinesti by Dergachev and ManzuraÐfrom the Prut-Dniester and
southern Bug regions. This migrational wave linked the Bug, Prut,
Dniester with the lower Don and with the north Caucasus; similar
funerary rites are also noted around the northeastern Azov steppes and
Samara on the middle Volga. The second migration occurred at the end
of the Eneolithic when the forest-steppe Repin (phase 2) culture
dispersed or colonized north along the Don, south, southeast, and
southwest. Fig. 3.49 illustrates the migrational waves of the Middle
and Late and Final Eneolithic, migrations that lead to the formation
of the Early Bronze Age Yamnaya culture.

Early Bronze Age: the Yamnaya culture (ca. 3000/2900 - ca. 2300-2200
BC). The Yamnaya culture extended over a vast territory and according
to Rassamakin's model it was a piecemeal "transformation of a series
of cultures, conditioned by a range of interdependent factors,
principally climatic and economic." (p. 125). In the Azov-Black Sea
steppes it absorbed elements from almost all the pre-existing Late
Eneolithic cultures, and almost all types of flexed burials are
represented. Rassamakin indicates that with the advent of the Yamnaya,
all the finer Eneolithic elements emerged as a "cruder, degraded
material culture." This appears to be particularly true along the
northwestern Black Sea coast and in the Kuban. Along the Volga, the
Repin tradition survived

Dating. Rassamakin discusses in detail the rational for the dating
used for his model. This is based on comparing steppe site assemblages
that include Cucuteni-Tripolye imports with the Cucuteni-Tripolye
periodization, now well established by C14 dating of materials
available in a sedentary population but sadly lacking in the steppe
world. He notes that comparative analyses with Maikop are unreliable.
The Cucuteni-Tripolye association is further justifiable because it
has been correlated with the Carpatho-Balkan culture system.

Reconstructing Economic Systems. The main thrust of this section
addresses the problem of horse domestication based upon Rassamakin's
reanalyzes of the Eneolithic and Early Bronze Age archaeological
materials. He concludes that in the Early Eneolithic people were
sedentary; hunting played a significant role in the economy. The
discussions cover existing theories; his conclusions are that during
the Early Eneolithic no evidence exists for nomadic horse-riding or
developed pastoralism. The argument for the Middle Eneolithic treats
Dereivka extensively. The author notes that horses began to be
extensively hunted but a horse breeding economy did not exist. The
Final Eneolithic saw the collapse of the sedentary agricultural
economies and various forms of mobile pastoralism began to develop. In
the Early Bronze Age, Rassamakin finds no evidence to indicate horses
were harnessed or ridden, and in fact, he states the horse is
virtually absent from the Yamnaya archaeological record.

Rassamakin's Conclusions. From this extensive and detailed study
Rassamakin draws seven major conclusions. Several are noteworthy: (a)
claims of eastern invasions from the Volga are groundless during the
time periods under discussion and the first genuine migrations from
the east do not occur until the Middle Bronze Age; (b) Dereivka does
not provide the earliest evidence for horse domestication and its
economy was not based on specialized horse breeding; (c) the Yamnaya
culture did not spread from any initial territory and occurred because
of a systematic transformation from the previous period; (d) there is
no evidence to indicate that the Usatova nor the Yamnaya cultures ever
became nomadic, nor did subsequent cultures in this region become
nomadic. Thus, the conditions for the emergence of nomadism were not
present in the north Black Sea steppes, and as the author reminds us,
written history indicates that nomadic societies came to the north
Black Sea steppes from the east.

"The Eastern Ural Steppe at the End of the Stone Age" by Aleksandr
Kislenko and Nataliya Tatarintseva. Sara Wright, Tr. (33pp.; 1.5 C14
dates; 1p. bibliography). 

[4][LINK] 

Map of Eneolithic and Bronze Age Sites

The authors limit their cursory research to two areas in the Ural and
Irtysh interfluve, the Turgai plateau, the adjacent northern Kazak
steppes between Petropavlovsk in the northwest and Karaganda in the
southeast, and, a third location, the Kyzyl-Kum and Kara-Kum deserts
to the east and south of the Aral Sea. Unfortunately, although the
charts and illustrations are very helpful, much is desired of the
superficial treatment of the topic, complicated by the lack of
organization of the materials by region and time period.

During the Stone Age (6th to mid-4th millennium BC), on the Turgai
plateau, the Makhandzhar culture was located along the Tobol and its
tributaries where the rivers providing good fishing and hunting
conditions. Populations lived in subterranean dwellings, their
ceramics were distinctive, and drilled spindle whorls indicate they
had mastered spinning and drilling techniques. Identified as the
Atbasar culture, Stone Age sites in central Kazakhstan were
concentrated along the banks of the Ishim, Chaglinka and Nura rivers
creating population micro-regions. Their tool assemblage is
distinctive and their pottery was comb-decorated, refuting the image
of a "ceramic-free" Kazakstan Neolithic. Only small and fragile
skeletal fragments of horse, cattle, and sheep are noted. Stone Age
sites in the Kyzyl-Kum were situated, not along rivers, but on the
plains between the Amu Darya and the Syr Darya.

Map 4.33 is valuable as it illustrates the locales of the Neolithic
and Eneolithic cultures and their interrelationships. The Yamnaya (in
this article considered to be Eneolithic) extended from west of the
Volga to the Orenburg steppes. Adjoining on the east, the Surtandy is
sandwiched by the Botai, and the Tashkovo sites are center north along
the Tobol, Ishim, and Irtysh rivers. Along the lower Irtysh, north and
south of Omsk the Ekaterinisk occupied the riverbanks. Far to the
west, the Keltiminar culture was found from the eastern banks of the
Caspian, extending eastward beyond the Amu Darya. The authors note
that during the Stone Age migrations occurred from the eastern Caspian
to the Ural-Irtysh region.

Favorable climatic conditions fostered the Eneolithic (4th-3rd
millennium BC) at a time when the flint industry subsided and copper
tools were introduced. The authors note that a link cannot be traced
between the Atbasar and the subsequent Botai or between the
Makhandzhar and the succeeding Tersek culture in the Turgai
regionÐalthough no further explanation is given. Discussion of the
Eneolithic centers around the Botai culture, specifically the type
site that existed for about 200 years (24th-22nd centuries BC),
providing schematics of stratigraphy, site plans, and settlement
reconstructions. Ritual dog burials, evidence of ancestor worship,
sawn and trepanned human skulls relate to cultic development while the
inventory list further provides a more humanistic approach to a
society primarily renown for its horse bones (from 70,000
individuals). Botai cultural materials in the southeast share
commonalties (but we are not told what these are) with the Afanasevo
in the Altai Mountains and with the Ust-Narym culture in eastern
Kazakstan.

Early Bronze Age settlements in northern Kazakhstan represent
different cultural-economic developments found at various stages.
Domestication of plants and animals was intensive, yet because of
climatic conditions, agriculture never took a firm hold. The absence
of nomadic forms of economy and specialized horse breeding is noted.

The authors speculate that it may be possible to identify two
epicenters for the emergence of stockbreeding economies: in the
Ural-Irtysh interfluve and in the more western Volga region. Without
doubt, additional research on materials available from previous
excavations in the three areas under discussion is badly needed.

Readers of this book should be aware of inconsistencies when the
archaeologicar records are discussed, particularly evident concerning
Botai in Chapters 2 and 4, i.e, 300 dwellings are noted on p. 39 while
158 are indicated on p. 202.

Although there are weak passages and Chapter 4 cannot be considered
more than a brief overview, having this well illustrated material in
English should prove to be extremely useful. I, for one, look forward
to continued studies.

Jeannine Davis-Kimball, CSEN

e-mail: [5]jkimball at csen.org

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References

1. http://www.csen.org/Articles_Reivews/Levine_et.al_review/Bookcover.gif
2. http://www.csen.org/Articles_Reivews/Levine_et.al_review/fig2.html
3. http://www.csen.org/Articles_Reivews/Levine_et.al_review/fig3.html
4. http://www.csen.org/Articles_Reivews/Levine_et.al_review/fig_4.html
5. mailto:jkimball at csen.org