КУРГАНЫ ЭЛИТЫ ПЕРИОДОВ ПОЗДНЕЙ ДРЕВНОСТИ И СРЕДНЕВЕКОВЬЯ НА ЮГЕ КУЛУНДЫ (НЕКРОПОЛИ ВОЛЧИХИНСКОГО РАЙОНА АЛТАЙСКОГО КРАЯ)

Abstract

The Volchikhinsky District of the Altai Territory is located in the southern part of the Kulunda Plain. This territory is the border zone of the southern Kulunda and the Priobskoye plateau. Most of the region is a steppe zone. This area is plowed. A large group of burial grounds of the elite of antiquity and the Middle Ages is concentrated in the Volchikhinsky district. It belongs to a large group of burial grounds with large mounds in the southern part of Kulunda. The Volchikha group includes 17 burial grounds. These are such necropolises as Pyatkov Log-I, Solonovka-I, Vostrovo-I, III. The most grandiose grave structures were found at the Pyatkov Log-I burial ground. They reach 90-100 m in diameter. These are large burial mounds 6 m high. They are surrounded by a wide ditch and rampart. To the south of this burial ground on the border of the northwestern foothills of Altai in the Aleiskaya steppe, a similar monument, Bugry, was investigated. This necropolis dates back to the end of the Scythian-Saka time. The mounds of the Pyatkov Log-I burial ground and most of the other elite mounds of the Volchikhinsky region also belong to this period. Keywords: Altai Territory, barrow group, "elite" burial structures, early Iron Age, Scythian-Saka time, Kulunda, Priobskoe plateau