Chronology of 3rd–5th Centuries Male Graves from the Tarasovo Burial Ground

Abstract

The article focuses on the chronological attribution of male graves from the late Mazunino stage of the Tarasovo burial ground in the Middle Kama area and is sequel to an earlier article about dating of the early Nyrgynda stage (1st – 2nd centuries) of the same site. We used here three main methods of research: formal typology, cultural stratigraphy and the nearest neighbor method. Eighty-six male graves of the 3rd – 5th centuries have been analyzed, of which we singled out 12 groups: 1st half of the 3rd century AD (group 1), 2nd half of the 3rdcentury. AD (group 2), the 3rd century (group 3); 1st half of the 4th century (group 4); 2nd half of the 3rd – 4th century (group 5); 3rd quarter of the 4th century (group 6); 4th quarter of the 4th century (group 7); 2nd half of the 4th century (group 8); 2nd half of the 4th – 5th century (group 9); the 4sup>th – 5th centuries (group 10); 2nd half of the 3rd – 5th centuries (group 11) and the 3rd– 5th centuries (group 12). In this article we consider the last 6 groups; the first six were examined in our previous paper. The analysis of this evidence allowed distinguishing several migration waves of militarized foreign cultural groups to the Lower and Middle Kama and the neighboring Volga region in the second half of th 3rd – 4th centuries, whose origins, characteristics and importance are still to be studied. Artifacts from the 3rd – 5th centuries female graves of the Tarasovo burial ground will be studied separately.

Keywords

• archaeology
• Middle Kama
• 1st – 4th centuries
• Tarasovo burial ground
• cultural stratigraphy
• chronology
• Mazunino stage
• Cheganda culture
• Pyany Bor culture-historical community
• migrations