The Petrovka Bronze Age Sites: Issues in Taxonomy and Chronology

Abstract

This article introduces a series of AMS radiocarbon dates for the Bronze Age Petrovka cemeteries in the Trans-Urals. The results of the AMS14C-dating of animal and human bones indicate a very high degree of concordance in the 19th and 18th centuries cal BC time range. The previously obtained AMS datings clearly fi t into the same chronological interval. Specifi cally, 17 of 36 analyses of the Petrovka series yielded very similar results. In other cases, where dating was based on wood and charcoal, the results are highly inconsistent, even within the same burial. Before the verifi cation of these results, the short interval based on AMS dates should be preferred. Its comparison with intervals for other cultures of the Trans-Urals demonstrates marked similarity: in fact, complete coincidence of some of them. At the same time, stratigraphic and typological evidence suggests that the Sintashta, Petrovka, and Alakul traditions are stages of a sequence. Additional arguments are features of continuity in the material culture and the practice of using the burial mounds of a previous culture for new graves, without destroying the older ones. In our view, the only explanation is provided by a dynamic scenario of cultural change spanning two centuries, from the migration of the Sintashta people to Southern Urals until the formation of the Alakul culture. The resolution of the radiocarbon method does not suffi ce to detect such rapid changes. If this explanation is correct, the Petrovka sites should be considered an early stage of the Alakul culture, rather than a separate culture.