The burial vault in the village of Fadeyevka in Primorye

Abstract

The burial complex was discovered on the territory of Fadeyevka Village in Primorye. Up to present, no site of the similar design has been found on that area. The seven-tier vault was made of stone blocks and had a burial pit located under the surface and served as a place for storage of the coffin. There was also an additional infant’s grave in the eastern part of the vault. Both graves are dated back to the end of XIX (the period of the Qing Dynasty (1644–1911)). The coffin contained remains of an adult woman enwrapped in a shroud. A Christian cross pendant was found inside the grave. Two candles that resembled chopsticks were placed into the dead’s mouth cavity. The inner part of the coffin was decorated circumferentially with the similar candle-sticks. Another Christian cross pendant (made of gold) was worn on the neck of the infant’s body. Those features of the funeral rites obviously indicate a sort of religious syncretism between Christianity and Buddhism. The research of this site gave us the opportunity to determine the fusion of the traditional religious views and new practices. The burial complex was constructed on the territory of the other archaeological object that had been built and destroyed earlier. Ceramic patterns of that object were dated back to the second part of I BC and can be associated with the archaeological culture of the early Iron Age — Krounovskaya Culture.