New Numismatic Materials of the 16th Century from the Seitovo 4 Burial Ground (the Middle Irtysh Region)

Purpose. The aim of the work is to introduce for the scientific community new numismatic items of the 16th century, which allow us to date the earliest burials of the Tara Tatars living in the region and, based on this data, establish some specific features of their burial rituals. Results. We conducted a crash-rescue operation and explored grave 1 on the burial ground Seitovo 4, which is located in the southern-taiga belt of Western Siberia on the right bank of the Irtysh River, in the Tara district of the Omsk region. The burial ground contained two silver coins of the Russian kingdom, which were in use during the reign of Ivan the 4th (the Grozny), and some other funeral inventory. The analysis of the elements of the burial structure and the inventory in the grave showed similarities with the funeral rituals discovered on the burial grounds of the 17th – 18th centuries located in this region. Most researchers relate these grounds to the antique ancestors of the Tara Tatars. However, until now, nothing has been known about the characteristic features of the funeral rite of this population during their early periods. Moreover, due to the lack of dating, early graves could not be distinguished from the later burials, which made it difficult to study their features. The materials analyzed give a better understanding of the formation and genesis of the burial rite under study. Analysis of the coins showed that these were so-called Moscow-issued personal “saber-dengi”, which were minted after the monetary reform of Ivan the 4th and led to the unification of the monetary system of the Russian tsardom. These coins are rarely found in Western Siberia, and in the Middle Irtysh region they are the most ancient Russian coins referring to 1538–1561. Conclusion. Written sources of the first quarter of the 17th – first half of the 18th centuries indicate that the ancestors of the Turaly and Ayaly groups of the Tara Tatars lived in this region at that time. The research allowed us to assert that the people buried there were the ancestors of the Tara Tatars. The results help to establish the lower bound of dating this grave and explore some of the features of the funeral rite of the modern Tara Tatars’ ancestors during their early periods.