B.S. Zhukov in the history of Russian archaeology: to the scientist’s anniversary

Abstract

B.S. Zhukov is one of the key figures in Russian archaeology of the 1920s. Palaeoethnological field of research at Moscow University was established by D.N. Anuchin who suggested his famous triad, a synthesis of prehistoric archaeology, anthropology and ethnography. In the early 1920s, Zhukov, his disciple, went further and put the teacher’s ideas into practice by proposing a research programme and building a team of young researchers – archaeologists, anthropologists, ethnologists, and experts in other areas. The leader of the palaeoethnological school, B.S. Zhukov did not only absorbed Anuchin’s idea of an interdisciplinary approach to the study of humans in their past and present development, but also implemented it in the course of large-scale complex expeditions and in-depth research. Zhukov’s school as a special research direction was developing for a short period in the mid and second half of the 1920s. However, it raised a generation of archaeologists, anthropologists and ethnologists, who made an invaluable contribution to the development of Russian and world science.