The Origin of the Ryazan-Oka Cruciform Fibulae and the Genesis of the Local Military Elite

Abstract

The study of the Ryazan-Oka culture has been going on for more than 100 years. Its main area is the Middle Pooch, with a significant tendency to dominate in the Volga-Oka interfluve from the first centuries of our era until the 60s of the VII century AD. With some degree of hypotheticism, the Ryazan-Oka center, along with the Old Ladoga, can be considered as one of the points of laying the foundations of the Old Russian statehood. The author's team sets itself the task of clarifying certain issues of the formation of the Ryazan-Oka elite on the basis of the latest DNA data and studying the most important cultural artifacts - the cross-shaped fibulae of elite warriors.The scientific novelty of the research is the combination of the study of objects of material culture with the latest DNA data. The study showed that the genesis of the most important attribute of the Ryazan-Oka elite - cross-shaped fibulae - can be associated with the shores of the Western Baltic and the North Sea (including Scandinavia). DNA data indicate the possible origin of a part of the military elite from the shores of the Baltic and the Northwestern part of the Eastern European Plain. Thus, it is quite legitimate to raise the question of migrations (of population and material culture) to the Ryazan-Oka area from the northwest. The latter could have an East Germanic, Baltic, Early Slavic, Baltic-Finnish linguistic affiliation.