The Southeastern Sindica Frontier: The Raevskoye Fortiﬁed Settlement

A. A. Malyshev,V. S. Batchenko

doi:10.17746/1563-0110.2020.48.2.069-079

A. A. Malyshev, V. S. Batchenko

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.17746/1563-0110.2020.48.2.069-079

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Abstract

The expansion of the Bosporan Kingdom (the interior colonization of Bosporus) was caused by the need for commercial grain in the Greek markets of the Mediterranean. The steep rise in the Bosporan rulers’ incomes followed the annexation of Sindica—one of the most fertile lands of the Northern Pontic region, situated in the Lower Kuban basin. This study discusses the history of the vast chora of the Greek Gorhippia in the southeastern fringes of Sindica, focusing on ﬁndings from a Bosporan fort—the Raevskoye fortiﬁed settlement. We reconstruct the evolution of the anthropogenic landscape of the area over four centuries (Hellenistic and Early Roman period). The chronology is based on a collection of Bosporan coins from the fortiﬁed settlement. We analyze the factors due to which the habitation layers of the fortiﬁed settlement span a period from the Early Bronze Age to the High Middle Ages. We provide a new topography of the Early Iron Age aboriginal site, along with that of the fortiﬁed site existing during the three Bosporan stages. Special attention is paid to the fortiﬁcation system, arranged in the Hellenistic period. Studies in recent decades have suggested that the fortiﬁcations were constructed according to the typical Bosporan technique of adobe-stone architecture. The fortiﬁed settlement evolved over a long period as an economic and political center of a large borderland zone between the Greek civilization and the archaic societies of the Caucasian piedmonta peculiar frontier of the classical era.

Highlights

The Bosporan Kingdom, which emerged ca 480 BC from the union of Greek poleis on the shores of the Cimmerian Bosporus, gained economic power and political influence in the ancient world from largescale wheat export
Batchenko / Archaeology, Ethnology and Anthropology of Eurasia 48/2 (2020) 69–79 archaeological evidence, the process of the intra-Bosporan colonization was manifested in the formation of chora of the Gorgippia polis, extending up to 20 km (Alekseeva, 1997: 22–23) and reaching the southeastern borders of Sindica (Anfimov, 1987: 90) later, in the Hellenistic period (3rd to 2nd centuries BC)
If the Eastern tower located at the highest point of the Raevskoye fortified settlement slightly protruded beyond the line of the rampart-like embankment, the Southeastern and Southern (1) towers extended far beyond the ramparts because of the postern-gallery (Fig. 6, 1, 4, 6, 7)***, which compensated for the length of curtain walls, exceeding the usual aiming range of the arrow (40– 60 m) (Medvedev, 1966: 32), and made it possible to control the movements from east to west in the area south of the fortress

Summary

Introduction

The Bosporan Kingdom, which emerged ca 480 BC from the union of Greek poleis on the shores of the Cimmerian Bosporus (the Kerch Strait), gained economic power and political influence in the ancient world from largescale wheat export. If the Eastern tower located at the highest point of the Raevskoye fortified settlement slightly protruded beyond the line of the rampart-like embankment, the Southeastern (corner) and Southern (1) towers extended far beyond the ramparts because of the postern-gallery (Fig. 6, 1, 4, 6, 7)***, which compensated for the length of curtain walls, exceeding the usual aiming range of the arrow (40– 60 m) (Medvedev, 1966: 32), and made it possible to control the movements from east to west in the area south of the fortress. Despite many years of research, residential and fortification adobe-stone structures of the Hellenistic period in the deeper areas of the Anapa Valley have been found only at the Raevskoye settlement This may point to small number in the Bosporus population in the region, and there are more likely political rather than economic reasons for large-scale construction at the fortified settlement. Centuries, and testify to the spread of technologies and economic practices of Antiquity in the region

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Discussion

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