Craniology of the Armenian highlands and ethnogenetic situation in Southern Eastern Europe in the Late Bronze Age and Iron Age

Abstract

The article is dedicated to the study of the anthropological composition and origin of various groups of the ancient population of Armenia. Along with the paleoanthropological materials previously published by other researchers, the author studied new collections, gathered by various archaeological expeditions of the Institute of Archeology and Ethnography of the National Academy of Sciences. We investigated a total number of 90 skulls of adult individuals of both sexes (57♂, 33♀). The new materials characterize the anthropological composition of the population of Lori, Shirak, Aragotsotni, Syunik regions of Armenia for the first time. The results of statistical analysis identified close affinities between the Transcaucasia samples and the samples from Southern Eastern Europe (Maikop, Lolinsk, Catacomb, Srubna cultures of the Fore Caucasus).

Keywords

• Craniology
• Armenia
• the Late Bronze and Iron Ages
• genesis