RESULTS OF THE EXPLORATION OF A SMALL WATCH FORTRESS OF THE SCYTHIAN ERA

Abstract

The article presents the results of the first studies of the defensive line of the hillfort located on the cape of the right bank of the river Don near the village 1st Storozhevoe in the Voronezh region. On a plot of 124 sq. m, a rampart, a moat and the adjacent territory were researched. Ceramic fragments were discovered that remained from an unfortified settlement of the Bronze Age. In the embankment of the rampart, four Sarmatian burials of the 1st - 2nd centuries AD were discovered. The fortifications themselves, according to the characteristic ceramic materialls of the beginning of the Scythian era, are dated to the second half of the 6th - beginning of the 5th centuries BC. At an early stage, they apparently consisted of a ground structure that had a defensive and residential purpose. At some distance from the building, there was also an outer wall. These structures are traced along three parallel grooves deepened into the clay. After the fire destroyed the structure, a rampart and a moat were erected in the settlement. In its present state, the embankment of the rampart has a width of about 6 m at the base, and a height above the mainland - more than 0.7 m. It consists mainly of dark gray loam, including lumps of red clay and burnt soil. The moat, now almost completely flooded by ground, is 1.5-1.9 m wide and up to 0.8 m deep.