Indo-European ornamental complexes and their analogs in the cultures of Eurasia - страница 8

Pottery exhibiting the Andronovo influence was found during excavations in Iran (Tables 2, 3). In the east, the Andronovo culture reaches the Yenisei, and in the north-west, on the territory of Northern Sweden, in the 10—8th century BC. the ceramics of the Andronovo type with a characteristic meander pattern was widespread, which M. Stenberger associates with the Ural-Siberian cultural group. (It is interesting to note that this culture in Scandinavia is replaced by ceramics of the Ananyin appearance, which existed here from the 4th to the 2nd century BC, while the Ananyin culture in the Volga region develops from the 7th to the 2nd century BC). Noting the kinship of ceramic decor among the Timber and Andronovo tribes, S. Z. Kiselev wrote: “…One cannot fail to note the obvious superiority of even the early Andronovo ceramics over its related Timber.” It is impossible to disagree with this; the forms of the Andronovo decor are so rich and varied. The richly ornamented Andronovo crockery in its classic version is known mainly from burial grounds. In connection with this circumstance, M. F. Kosarev makes the following assumption: “Ornate dishes of the classical Andronovo style with rich geometric ornamentation are ritualistic and therefore were especially characteristic in burial grounds and sacrificial sites”. G. B. Zdanovich also believes that the magnificently ornamented dishes were ceremonial, cult. Speaking about ceramics typical for burials, he states that we have before us “a vivid manifestation of cultural traditionalism in the funeral rite”, while in everyday life new dishes have been used for a long time, dishes of old traditional forms are put in burials. “The latter is no longer used for everyday household and household needs, and the very fact of its existence is determined by ritual purposes”. But on the classical (ritual) Andronov dishes, we find the same set of ornamental motifs characteristic of ritual sculpture and vessels in Tripillya – meander, meander spiral, swastika, a number of jibs, etc. While retaining the archetype, they acquire a great variety. Speaking about the specificity of the ornamentation of this ceramics, S. V. Kiselev noted its deep originality, the zonality of the arrangement of various patterns, in which the place of one or another pattern in the zones is usually the same. He said that the complex forms of the Andronovo patterns “were quite likely to be realized with their conditional symbolism… their special meaning, symbolic meaning are emphasized by their special complexity”. M. D. Khlobystina expressed herself even more definitely: “There was, apparently, a kind of communal core, a collective bound by the norms of patriarchal disposition, which, in turn, had certain pictorial symbols of its tribal affiliation, encrypted for the researcher in a complex interweaving of geometric It can be assumed that a kind of leading element of such ornaments is a number of figures located on the shoulders of the vessel: study of the number and combination of these particular patterns, represented by S-shaped signs, meanders, segments of broken lines and their variations, maybe obviously play a role in clarifying the structure of each community.”

Ornament of Andronovo culture

Karasuk ornament

We share the point of view of those researchers who are convinced of the deeply significant content of the Andronovo ornament, consecrated by tradition: after all, it is no coincidence that vessels with just such a decor were placed in the graves, i.e. they probably really performed the functions of a clan or tribal sign, were a kind of “visiting card” in the journey of the deceased to their ancestors, who, by these ornamental “letters”, should have recognized a member of their clan, their tribe. In this sense, the ornament on Andronovo ceramics served as a talisman, protecting its owner on the way to another world or asking the gods for mercy. Thus, we can once again state that the carpet ornament of the Andronov crockery was probably a kind of sign, a symbol of the tribal and ethnic identity of a person whose things were decorated with this particular ornament. In this sense, it, apparently, was preserved in the Karasuk era (12—7 century BC), when the