Население Кумо-Манычской впадины эпохи средней бронзы: палеодемографический анализ (по материалам археологических раскопок на территории Республики Калмыкия 1965–2001 гг.)

Abstract

Introduction. This work is devoted to research of the population living on the territory of the Republic of Kalmykia during the Middle Bronze Age. The object of the study was anthropological material from burials of the Catacomb culture excavated in the area of the Kuma-Manych depression, one of the landscape-geographical zones on the territory of the republic. The purpose of the study is a paleodemographic analysis of anthropological materials from four burial mounds: Eastern Manych, Chograisky, Ostrovnoy and Zunda Tolga. Materials and methods. The materials for the study were bone remains from the burial grounds of the Kuma-Manych depression, stored in the collections of the Kalmyk Scientific Center of the Russian Academy of Sciences, as well as data from a craniological series from the Vostochny Manych burial ground, stored in the Museum of Anthropology and Ethnography of St. Petersburg. The study used traditional anthropological methods, as well as programs developed for constructing mortality tables and assessing pathological conditions on bone remains. Results and conclusions. Research has shown that the population of the Kuma-Manych depression is similar in some paleodemographic indicators to synchronous groups living on the territory of the republic, which is expressed in the average age of death of the adult population and the sex ratio in the group. But it is distinguished by high rates of the final age cohort, a small difference in the average age of death in the male and female groups, which is not traditional for societies of that period. This work contributes to the introduction of new anthropological data into scientific circulation.