Byzantine Crosses with Inlay in the South-Western Crimea
Abstract
Archaeological materials played an important role for the studies of the history of Christianity in the South-Western Crimea. Especially interesting are individual artefacts of Christian cult, pectoral crosses in particular. Crosses in costumes of the barbarians of the South-Western Crimea appear in the second half of the 6th century. They were mainly mass goods that were brought from Byzantium and were manufactured in Cherson and jewellery workshops of the country of Dori. This paper analyses byzantine crosses from 550–625 AD with inlay. It was the earliest and the most popular type of crosses among the Crimean Goths. The location of beads and crosses documented in situ in graves provides arguments to reconstruct necklaces and costume which components they formed. Only women and girls wore these crosses in necklaces, accompanied with beads and varied amulets. Many necklaces contained several crosses, which could be explained as the understanding of cross as an amulet. Crosses, as other things of personal godliness, as well as numerous objects with Christian symbols, are a bright evidence of Christianity spreading in Crimea. Crimean finds enlarge our notion of everyday Christian culture in the early mediaeval period, thus forming a striking evidence of close economic and cultural relations of the Crimea and the Byzantine Empire in the early Middle Ages.
Keywords
