To the question of definition of the age of the Big Shigir idol
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 2614356 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Svetlana Savchenko (0000-0001-8357-3944, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2024 |
| Volume | 12 |
| Issue | 1 |
| Pages | 72-93 |
| Publication date | 2024-06-15 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Camera praehistorica (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 2658-3828 • E-ISSN: 2658-6665 |
| Publisher | Peter the Great Museum of Anthropology and Ethnography of the Russian Academy of Sciences (The Kunstkamera) (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.31250/2658-3828-2024-1-72-93 |
| OpenAlex | W4400864001 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 5 |
The article is devoted to problems of dating of the monumental wooden sculpture accidentally found in 1980 during gold mining at the Shigir peat bog in the Trans-Urals. In 1997 mesolithic age of wood of the sculpture was established with the help of conventional method in radiocarbon laboratories of the Institute for the History of Material Culture (St. Petersburg) and of the Geological Institute (Moscow). In 2014 series of radiocarbon dates were obtained with the help of AMS method in Claus Chir laboratory (Manheim, Germany) which enabled dating of the sculpture to the Early Mesolithic. Results of dendrological analysis carried out by the head of the Dendrological laboratory of the German archaeological Institute (Berlin) K.-U. Heussner, traceological study of the sculpture carried out by the leading researcher of the Institute of Archaeology RAS M.G. Zhilin, and analysis of environmental dynamics in the Mesolithic of the Trans-Urals confirm such early date. But despite the obtained results the age of a unique artefact remains a subject of discussion. Articles were published where doubt in the early date of the sculpture was put forward. N.M. Chairkina basing on the fact that uninterrupted accumulation of peat started in the Trans-Urals at the end of the Boreal - Early Atlantic period, and traces of peat were found in ancient cracks of the sculpture suggests its dating to this time. E.A. Kashina studied stylistic peculiarities of anthropomorphic faces of the sculpture and found some analogies among archaeological materials from the forest zone of Eastern Europe and the Trans-Urals, which are dated mainly to the IV-III millennia BC. She dates the Big Shigir idol to this time, and explains Mesolithic dates by the use of fossil larch tree trunk for creation of the sculpture. Relentless interest of researchers to this question demanded a new analysis of all facts and arguments including ones achieved during latest research of the Big Shigir idol
Archaeology · Art · Geography · Mesolithic · Peat · Period (music · Polychrome · Radiocarbon dating · Sculpture
| Citation velocity | historical |
|---|---|
| Highly cited | No |