On The Four-Pointed Pommel Of The Medieval Mace Found In Chechnya

Abstract

In the autumn of 1888, Countess P.S. Uvarova, who headed the Imperial Moscow Archeological Society arrived in Grozny,because she heard about the discovery of precious objects in the mounds of Chechnya that encouraged local people to search for precious objects. Among the objects was an iron pommel of the strike weapon found near Atag. However, in the report “The Burial Grounds and Barrows of the Caucasus” delivered by P.S. Uvarova in 1888,this object was not mentioned. The the iron pernach was mentioned among the objects found in the mound "similar to five mounds" dug on the left bank of the Sunzhi River near Grozny. For a long time, this discovery did not attract attention.In 1966, A.N. Kirpichnikov did not mention it as an analogy of ancient Russian strike weapons. The pommer was not mentioned in the reports about the medieval weapons of the North Caucasus (including Chechnya and Ingushetia) which encouraged us to describe the weapon and the history of its discovery. It was established that in contrast to the vast majority of previously published strike weapons, the weapon belongs to a group of spiny maces of the second half of the XI- the first half of the XIII centuries, i.e. of the Pre-Mongolian era.