Social Portrait of the Christian Elite of Western Alania According to the Materials of the Excavations of the Middle Zelenchuk Church

Abstract

From 2018 on, the Nizhny Arkhyz Archaeological Expedition of the Institute of Archaeology of the Russian Academy of Sciences, the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences, the National Research University Higher School of Economics, and the U. D. Aliev Karachay-Cherkessia State University has been conducting comprehensive interdisciplinary research at the ancient Nizhny Arkhyz (Republic of Karachay-Cherkessia), located on the site of a mediaeval town which was the capital of Western Alania from the tenth to early thirteen century. One of the main objects of the research is the tenth-century Middle Zelenchuk Church and its cemetery from the tenth to thirteen centuries. The works of the expedition resulted in the unique archaeological and paleoanthropological materials, particularly from all the burial assemblages that survived in the inner space of the church; these undoubtedly belonged to the representatives of the nobility of this mediaeval Christian polity. First time in the history of studying the capital of mediaeval Alania, the analysis of these materials by methods of archaeology, anthropology, and natural sciences complex provided an opportunity for a closer examination of the daily life of its population, the social, demographic, professional composition of various urban strata, and the private life of the residents of Nizhny Arkhyz. This article reflects the most striking results of researches of the social portrait of the secular elite of Western Alania, which concern the ethno-cultural composition of this social stratum of the urban population, the quality of its life, funeral traditions, and the reconstruction of individual episodes of the life of a representative of the tenth-century professional military class, who was honoured with the burial in one of the most venerated churches of Alania.