The burial of the princely era from the ancient Buzhesk: analysis and verification of the archaeological materials

Abstract

Materials that belong to the horizon of the burial ground of the princely period from the Small Hill-fort in the Busk town of Lviv region were systematized, analyzed, and verified. The archaeological excavations on the site continued in 2015, 2017–2019, and 2021 years, as a result of which 62 inhumation burials were investigated on 142 square meters. The analysis of vertical and horizontal stratigraphy and the thickness of the cultural layer (up to 90 cm) of the cemetery allow us to state at least two phases of burials. It is established that the graves were arranged around a wooden church, from which the destruction of the filling, laid with ceramic glazed tiles, has been preserved. The number of burials and their orientation according to the Christian canon (head to the west, 20 buried) with seasonal deviations to the south (20) and north (18) west were also recorded. The contours of burial pits are traced only in those quantitatively insignificant cases when they were dug into the mainland, or the filling of deep dwellings of earlier times. Remains of wooden rectangular houses have been found in 14 burials, and iron nails have also been found. Particular attention is paid to the hands laying of the dead. It is accepted that those buried with their arms crossed on their stomachs may be earlier than those with their arms crossed on their chests. At the same time, in detail, with references to the paleopathologist O. Kozak, it is shown that the position of the hands of the deceased can be influenced by both ritual practices and their taphonomy. In almost a third of the analyzed burials, «stone pillows» were found, represented by ordinary stones, as well as fill tiles from the church floor and even an iron ingot. Artifacts found as accompanying inventory (two glass beads, part of a glass bracelet, two temple rings, part of a bilon ring) belong to the standard products distributed in the Galician-Volyn territories. During the dating of the necropolis from Small Hill-fort, several groups of data were involved: stratigraphic observations, ceramic materials from the cultural layer of the cemetery, the principle of laying the hands of the dead, accompanying inventory, and information from written sources. As a result of their comparison, it was concluded that the cemetery on the territory of the Busk Small Hill-fort could have existed from the second half of the 12th – to the first half of the 14th century. The analysis and verification of the excavated burials gave grounds to claim that on the territory of the Busk Small Hill-fort there is a suburban Christian church cemetery, which together with a wooden church formed a kind of sacred space in the historical landscape of ancient Buzhsk. Key words: chronicle Buzhsk, Small Hill-fort, an earthen cemetery of the princely era, inhumation burials, «stone pillows», temple rings, ceramic glazed tiles.