DAGGERS-"INSERTS" OF PAZYRYK CULTURE OF THE ALTAI MOUNTAINS
Abstract
The article deals with the peculiar artifacts of Pazyryk culture of the Altai Mountains, the scaled-down copies of bronze daggers, placed in full-size wooden scabbards. A series of 10 daggers from the Uzuntal valley burial-mounds of Scythian period (5th - 3rd centuries BC) excavated by the author in 1971-1973 as well as most of such objects (more than one hundred specimens) from other burials of the Altai Mountains known nowadays became the main source for this research. Average length of the daggers varies from 14,5-15 to 19,5-20 cm, there are also smaller ones (10-12 cm) while average length of battle daggers reaches 35-40 cm, but no less than 30 cm. Thus, there have been already diverse opinions expressed on the religious significance of scaled-down daggers. According to the author, the discrepancy in size between “insert” daggers and full-sized wooden scabbards is the key point in explaining the votive nature of these pieces: hanging on the belt of the buried deceased, such «insert» dagger looked real due to scabbard - this imitation (twin or soul? of a dagger) was probably intended for reincarnation while the ordinary dagger was left in the society as a kind of “guaranty” or for further use.
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