Metal of the Abashevo Culture from the Middle Don

Abstract

The results of a morphological and typological study, spectral, atomic emission spectrometric and metallographic analyzes of 20 items from the burial grounds and the settlement of the Abashevo culture from the territory of Voronezh Oblast are presented. The metal is represented by tools, adornments and other categories of items typical of the cultures of the first phase of the West Asian (Eurasian) metallurgical province. Slightly more than half of the items from the collection (56.3%) are made of pure copper (including oxidized copper), 25% of the tools are made of low-alloyed As-bronze, and 18.7% of the items are made of antimony-arsenic bronze. Based on the similar chemical composition of the metal of the Abashevo tribes from the Don and the Urals, it was concluded that copper and bronze came to the Middle Don from the Abashevo metallurgists of the Southern Urals. Part of the products came in the form of imports from the Sintashta or Seima-Turbino communities. The difference in the specifics of the technological aspects of the settlement and burial complexes is associated either with the time difference between the complexes or with a special selection of ritual grave goods.

Keywords

• archaeology
• bronze age
• abashevo culture
• middle don region
• spectrometric analysis
• metallographic analysis
• historical and metallurgical links