PETROGLYPHES OF THE EARLY MEDIEVAL AGE IN THE TERRITORY OF MONGOLIA: THE MAIN STAGES AND RESULTS OF RESEARCH
Abstract
The article concerns with the history of the study of petroglyphs of the early Middle Ages on the territory of Mongolia. The process of accumulation and diverse interpretation of information about rock paintings, as well as images on “memorial” objects dating back to the second half of the 1<sup>st</sup> millennium AD is characterized. The analysis of the main results of the study of the petroglyphs of the early medieval nomads of the region allowed the authors to identify several key stages in the history of their study. The first stage, within which the initial formation of the source base took place, is associated with the discovery and fixation at the end of the 19<sup>th</sup> century of stylized images of goats, carried out as a rule in the study of epigraphic sites. The beginning of the second stage coincides with the large-scale archaeological research that took place in Mongolia in the middle of the 20<sup>th</sup> century. The third stage, which began in the mid-1970s, marked the expansion of scientists’ ideas about the rock art of the population of Mongolia in the second half of the 1<sup>st</sup> millennium AD, as well as the identification of various pictorial layers in it. Within the framework of the modern period (since the mid-1990s), approaches to the study of early medieval petroglyphs are being improved, new sites are being discovered, as well as a more detailed study of already known complexes. The article contains images recorded during the field research of the authors as part of the Buyant Russian-Mongolian archaeological expedition.
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