Most visible monuments are about 20 constructively and architecturally unusual megalithic mausolea. As a rule, mausolea are fenced with square or oval layout of two or three stone masonry walls or stone slabs up to 3 tons each encircling a central room and covered by slabs as a perimeter gallery with diameter up to 30 m, and with occasional entrance chamber. The central roof-covered chamber is built with stones and multiple square pillars that support the roof, enclosing a massive sarcophagus. Mausolea are surrounded by ordinary kurgan burials. The cemeteries are close to large settlements with housesbuilt of granite slabs, with pillars and thick walls, connected by corridors.
Begazy-Dandybai culture preserved artifacts of the Bronze Age, and at the same time forms archaeological features of the Early Iron Age. The accompanying burial inventory has richly decorated vessels notable for thin-wall pottery, polished surface, geometric ornamentation, and tamga-type characters on the surface, along with rough ceramics of proto-Tasmola type. The Begazy mausoleum produced tanged bronze arrowheads, which typologically indicated the upper date of the culture, its architecture and housing are notable for their innovations. Pottery, and bronze and golden ware deposited in mausolea found its influence in the succeeding nomadic Tasmola culture.Begazy-Dandybai people produced jewelry: silver and gold bracelets, rings, charms, pendants, earrings, buckles, and diadems (of approximately 86 % gold, 13 % silver and 1 % copper).
Begazy-Dandybai villages were located at the feet of rocky hills, close to plentiful sources of water and fuel. In the Tokraun, Nura, Sary Su, Atasu, Ishim, Selety, and other valleys were densely located villages of ancient miners and metallurgists. Begazy-Dandybai people produced pots, pitchers, bowls, cups, vessels with spouts, etc. Ceramic pots were fired globular jugs with high neck and collar rim. Ceramic was made of clay mixed with granitic sand. Grave inventory and dwellings contain many metal and bone tools: bronze pins, needles, buttons, linings, bone needle boxes, and buttons. Large number of tools was used in mining: hammers, picks, hoes, graters, mortars, pestles, and stone molds.
Begazy-Dandybai culture, located in favorable mountainous area protected by dry steppes, formed in the same territory succeeding pastoralist nomadicTasmola culture, dispersed throughout central Kazakhstan in the Karaganda, Akmola, and Pavlodar provinces, and Saka culture, but the megalithic architecture is not shared. Begazy-Dandybai material culture is similar to the contemporaneous Karasuk culture and the following Tasmola culture. The Andronovo culture is held as preceding culture. There is no consensus on genetical and cultural connections of the Begazy-Dandybai culture. Opinions divide between predominantly indigenous and predominantly migrant origin. The ancient tribes of the Kazakhstan Bronze Age were descendants of the Kazakhstan Neolithic population, and became ancestors of the Sakas, Usuns, and Kangly tribes.
Essential Vocabulary
Tasks:
1. Read the text «Begazy-Dandybai Culture». Write and memorize unknown words and word combinations.
2. Translate the text into Russian.
Answer the following questions:
1. When was the Begazy-Dandybai culture described and analyzed in detail?
2. What monuments of Begazy-Dandybai are the most famous?
3. What kind of jewelry did Begazy-Dandybai people produce?
4. Where were Begazy-Dandybai villages located?
5. Who discovered the culture and took it for a local version?
THE EXPEDITIONS OF THE INSTITUTE OF ARCHAEOLOGY AFTER A.KH. MARGULAN
The Institute of archaeology after A.Kh.Margulan is renowned by its legendary expeditions well known now that set the ground for the large-scale and even epochal researches. The people that led the first Kazakhstani expeditions left a bright trace in the science of the country, in the destiny of the Institute and archaeologists who became today the acknowledged specialists themselves.
Under the leadership of the well-known scientist A.Kh.Margulan beginning from 1945 there worked the first archaeological expedition – the Central-Kazakhstani one. Its researches became the starting point for the studying of the Begazy-Dandybay culture. The expedition detected, investigated and studied the stopping places of the Neolithic and Eneolithic epochs, the settlements and burial-grounds of the Andronov and the Begazy-Dandybay cultures, the burial erections of the 1-st millennium B.C., the kurgans of the Turkic times, the medieval town sites and settlements.
In 1957 there upon the territory of Saryarka began the researches of the team for the study of the monuments of the epoch of the early nomads headed by M.K.Kadyrbayev as part of the Central-Kazakhstani archaeological expedition. Of a special significance was the material obtained in the course of the researches made upon the burial-ground Tasmol. As a result there by M.K.Kadyrbayev was singled out the Tasmoly early-Scythian archeological culture.
The Ili archeological expedition (further the Semirechensk one) headed by K.A.Akishev was organized in 1954. Already in the first season the expedition discovered a great accumulation of the kurgan burial grounds of the epochs of the Scythians and Usuns, the summary of the materials of the excavations of which served as the basis for a serious monograph, there were introduced into scientific circulation the unique materials from the researches of the kurgans Besshatyr.
In 1957 there was organized the team for the study of the monuments of the Stone age in the region of the ridge of the Lesser and Great Karatau head by Kh.Alpysbayev. The scientists managed to detect the Shelsk-Ashelsk places and monuments of the Myustyer period. The classics of archeology of the Stone age of Kazakhstan one can name the Paleolithic stopping place after Shokan Ualikhanov on the right bank of the river Arystandy. The lower-Paleolithic monuments were found in the lower reaches of the river Shu. There by the well-known Kazakhstani scientist A.G.Medoyev were found the stone tools of the Siberian Paleolithic period near the Northern part of the Balkhash lake. Of big importance for the studying of the lower Paleolithic period of Kazakhstan is the stopping place Koshkurgan which has the reliably dated stratigraphic context. It was proved that there in Southern Kazakhstan exist the monuments of the lower Paleolithic epoch. Of crucial importance for the archeology of the Broze epoch of the Eurasian belt of the steppes were the researches of the Zhezkazgan metallurgical centre, in which the greatest role was played by K.I.Satpayev as president of the Academy of Sciences of the Kazakh SSR who rendered great support.
One of the objects of the Southern-Kazakhstani archaeological expedition was the Otrar oasis. The result of the works made by the Southern-Kazakhstani archaeological expedition was the research, cartographic works and the chronology of the great group of the ancient town sites and settlements in the Otrar oasis, upon the Northern slopes of Karatau, in the valley of Syrdaria. The systematic planning and detailed study of the oasis and its hydrotechnical erections was undertaken by the Otrar archeological expedition under the leadership of K.A.Akishev. During the 40 years there were studied the sites of the former cities Otyrar, Kuiryktobe, Kokmardan, Altyntobe and others (headed by academician Baipakov K.M.).
Of high importance not only for the archeology of the early nomads of Kazakhstan and the whole Great belt of the steppes of Eurasia but for the whole studies of the culture of the nomads was the discovery by K.A.Akishev and B.Nurmukhanbetov of the burial ground not plundered by the black illegal archeologists at the kurgan Issyk, the finds from which subsequently were used for the creation of the state symbols of Independent Kazakhstan. The unique artifacts of jewelry art being a testimony of the high level of development of the ancient nomads were discovered accidentally in 1988 in the Kegen district of the Almaty region – Zhalauly.
In the first years of Independent Kazakhstan there on the territory of the new state the archaeologists could continue the works: from 1992 there operated the Kazakh-Russian expedition, which carried out the joint works on the territory of Russia and Kazaqkhstan within the framework of the programme «The Paleo-ecology of ancient man and the initial mastering