A FEW MYTHS ABOUT BUDZHAK YAMNA CULTURE

Abstract

Graves of the North-West Pontic were identified by N. Merpert into a spe­cific cultural version of the Yamna cultural-historic entity community (Мерперт, 1974). Later on, L. Klein referred them to a particular “Nerushay” culture, which I. Cherniakov renamed into the “Late Yamna Budzhak” culture1. In our view, the specificity of the Budzhak culture was manifested already at its formation stage, which allows synchronizing it with the Yamna cultural-historical region in gen­eral: 3100-2200 BC and not only with the late Yamna period. Two stages in the genesis of the Budzhak culture can be identified: the early and the late, with the boundary within the range of 2600/2500 BC. To date, almost 600 Eneolithic and Early Bronze barrows have been excavated in the North-Western Pontic Region; about 3000 burials of the Budzhak culture have been found. It is significant that, three fourth of the barrows were built by Budzhak tribes themselves, while in oth­er cases they used Eneolithic or Usatovo mounds. Five main positions of the buried body can be identified (fig. 1): Some researchers distinguish up to 50 positions of the buried person, de­pending on the position of the hands and the inclination of the skull (Яровой, 1985). Others consolidate all variants of the position into three poses: supine, on the right side, on the left side, or even into two poses: supine, on the side. Certain grave goods are often associated with the buried in certain position, allowed the identification of "ritual groups". Some finds are common to different groups. There are suppositions that the differences between the groups are chrono­logical, and connected with living in different geographical zones – steppe and forest-steppe. There is an opinion that people of Budzhak/Yamna culture inhabit­ed only the area between the Carpathian and Dniester Rivers. It is also assumed that the eastern border between the Budzhak/Yamna culture and the Southern Bug variant of the Yamna culture is carried out on the border of Mikolaiv and Odessa region of Ukraine. The author attributes these assumptions to the myths about the Budzhak/Yamna culture.