Anthropology
Related: About this forumMassive Tomb Of A Badass Scythian Prince Found In Siberia
Massive Tomb Of A Badass Scythian Prince Found In Siberia
The Mongols are often thought to be the biggest badasses in history, but centuries before Genghis Khan and his cronies took over most of Asia and Europe, there lived an equally ruthless bunch of nomadic warriors in Siberia known as the Scythians (pronounced "SIH-thee-uns" .
However, their on-the-go lifestyle means that archaeologists actually know relatively little about them. Thats why its exciting news that archaeologists funded by the Swiss National Science Foundation have found the earliest and largest tomb of a Scythian prince in the Russian republic of Tuva, southern Siberia. Their discovery was recently published in the journal Archaeological Research in Asia.
These ancient people, typically covered in tattoos and gold jewelry, raised hell between 900 BCE and 200 BCE across the vast plains of Siberia. The term Scythian doesn't strictly describe a unified civilization, as such, but it's a term used to classify a group of tribes who shared a similar culture in southern Siberia around this time. Perhaps the Scythian's biggest cultural legacy was becoming one of the earliest groups of warriors to master horse-mounted warfare.
The newly discovered tomb, known as a kurgan, consists of a wooden beam-lined grave and a burial mound of circular stones. Analysis of these wooden beams showed the tomb dates back to the 9th century BCE, making it the earliest known tomb belonging to a Scythian leader.
More:
http://www.iflscience.com/editors-blog/massive-tomb-of-a-badass-scythian-prince-found-in-siberia/
pangaia
(24,324 posts)marble falls
(62,041 posts)Judi Lynn
(162,361 posts)By Megan Gannon, Live Science Contributor | January 16, 2018 06:41am ET
Archaeologists working in southern Siberia have identified an untouched, frozen burial mound that they say might contain the graves of Scythian royals. The monument which is more than 2,800 years old and wider than the length of a football field could be the oldest and largest in the region.
The Scythians were horse-riding nomads who dominated a vast stretch of the central Eurasian steppes and grasslands from about the ninth century B.C. to about the first century B.C. Among outsiders, they had a reputation as fearsome warriors. Writing in the fifth century B.C., Greek historian Herodotus claimed that after battle, the Scythians made cloaks from their victims' scalps and drinking cups from their skulls.
While the Scythians did not build any settlements, they did leave behind huge burial mounds, which they filled with gold jewelry, weapons, richly decorated cups (some with traces of drugs like opium) and other grave goods. Because many of these mounds are built on permanently icy soil, some of the burials are quite literally frozen in time; archaeologists have even discovered Scythian ice mummies. [In Photos: Boneyard of Iron Age Warriors]
Since the 1970s, archaeologists have been excavating several burial mounds, called kurgans, in the Uyuk Valley in Tuva, a Russian republic, just northwest of Mongolia. The area is sometimes called the Siberian "Valley of the Kings," referring to the place where pharaohs were buried for 500 years in ancient Egypt.
More:
https://www.livescience.com/61432-frozen-scythian-tomb-siberia.html?utm_source=notification