PRODUCTION BUILDINGS OF THE NAROVCHAT ANCIENT SETTLEMENT OF THE GOLDEN HORDE PERIOD

Abstract

The Narovchat ancient settlement (the territory of the present-day urban-type settlement Narovchat, the district center in the Penza region) is the remains of the Golden Horde city of Mokhshi, which had the status of the center of ulus on the northwestern periphery of the Golden Horde, in the Upper Moksha basin. All identified production buildings of the archaeological site were furnaces for fi ring and baking bricks and pottery. The purpose of the work is to give the most detailed structural and morphological characteristics and topographic reference to the production buildings of the Narovchat settlement. The materials for the article were reports on archaeological works in 1959 and 1963 by A.Ye. Alikhova and in 1989 and 1990 by Yu.A. Zeleneyev and some scientific publications. Three furnaces were discovered in the central part of the Narovchat fortification (the area of modern Sovetskaya Square in Narovchat). Two furnace were discovered nearby Narovchat, in the place Krasny Klyuch. The furnaces of the central part of the Narovchat ancient setlement were characterized by the round or oval shape, relatively small sizes and the two-chamber construction. Presumably, they were used for burning unglazed pottery. Reconstruction of the furnaces nearby Krasny Klyuch is hampered by poor preservation. They were rectangular and trapezoidal form in plan. The combustion of the chamber consisted of arched structures. The upper part of the furnaces was destroyed. This makes it difficult to identify the construction characteristics.

Keywords

• archaeology
• upper moksha region
• golden horde
• narovchat ancient settlement
• production buildings
• pottery
• furnace for burning pottery