IMPORT OR IMITATION: CHARACTERISING THE BUDZHAK CULTURE OF THE NORTH-WEST PONTIC REGION

Abstract

Specific feature of the cultural-historical genesis of the North-Western Pontic Region at the turn of the 4th to the 3rd mill. BC is manifested by relations of its population with a foreign cultural environment. This concerns, first and foremost, the Budzhak culture that is a component of the Pit-Grave (Yamna) cultural-historical region. The Budzhak culture represents connections with the Carpathian and Danube, the Corded Ware and the Globular Amphora cultures. The contacts were reflected in two aspects: imports, imitations and parallels in the Budzhak pottery and the occurrence of the Yamna burials found in other territories. Some forms of pottery and elements of its dйcor are rather surprisingly similar to central European groups of the Corded Ware culture. The analysis of the mainland culture of the Budzhak population enables us to assume the existence of contacts with the Corded Ware culture circle as early as in the first half of the 3rd mill. BC. The current state of research on the movement of Yamna cultural aspect towards west is also discussed in the paper. The recent genetic analysis results the link of Yamna and Corded Ware populations. They were treated as the evidence of direct massive migration of Steppe people into Central Europe. Archaeological data supporting this concept are few if any. The westernmost enclaves of Yamna culture rather indicate limited intrusion of specialized groups aimed at control of exchange routs and raw material extraction places. It is suggested that formation of Balkan-Carpathian variant of Yamna cultural-historical community is connected to the expansion of the tribes of the Budzhak culture of the North-West Pontic region. The western group of Yamna-Budzhac culture is distinctively different from «core» Yamna by typology of pottery while both aspects share the similar burial rites. The information obtained as a result of many years of excavations of barrows of the North-Western Pontic Region allow defining the Budzhak culture not only as a unique structural entity within the Yamna cultural-historical area but also as a mobile community opened to «cultural dialogue» and capable of long-distance migrations. Indications of that include imports, imitations, derivatives in the material complex, as well as the population’s westward movement to the Central European and Balkan-Carpathian Region.