The presence of fortified settlements and advanced metallurgy were necessary conditions leading up to the development of towns in the Steppe. The specific ecological situation of the vast Steppe, however, was exploited not by the economic intensification and specialization of herding and farming, but by the expansion of pastoral activities more suitable to the Steppe. The pastoral peoples thus abandoned the process of urbanization that had begun to take shape in the eighteenth century B. C. and instead adopted extensive livestock husbandry, which required larger areas of land. The large Timber-Grave and Andronovo communities came into existence. Their florescence marked the following—fifth—stage of economic development in the Steppe (Kuzmina 2003).
The fifth stage—the fifteenth-thirteenth centuries B. C.—is characterized by the peak florescence of the Steppe culture, apparent from the large quantities of Timber-Grave ?md Andronovo settlements and burial grounds, exceeding by several times the number of the sites of previous periods.
The locations of the settlements, situated on the flood plains or on the upper terraces above the floodplains, the very areas that today are subject to flooding, points to the fact that the climate was drier and warmer during the Bronze Age. According to the paleobotanical and osteological studies in the Ukraine, in the Volga Region, and in the Ural region (Kremenetsky 1991; Spiridonova 1991; Lavrushin, Spiridonova 1995a, b), the vegetation and fauna were similar to the present. The author’s studies and analyses of charcoal from the Elenovsky area settlements, as determined by G. N. Lisitsina, indicate the presence of lime, birch, aspen, and fir (the Siberian pine); the Siberian pine does not exist in the Asian Steppe zone today. This is supported by the presence of beaver bones in many settlements of the Urals and Kazakhstan, where nowadays this animal is extinct. But the main fauna representatives are the Steppe Zone animals. Such landscape and climatic conditions were favorable for conducting a complex economy.
By the second millennium B. C., the situation in the Steppe had become stable, and the Timber-Grave and Andronovo communities had consolidated (Figs. 24-28). This is apparent from the unification of funeral rites and the types of ceramics. The population had a settled way of life; people inhabited unfortified setdements, usually consisting of large, long-term, semi-subterranean houses. In the forest-steppe the dwellings were constructed of framework-and-post, and in the Steppe stone was often used.
Farming was practiced, as made apparent by the discovery of grains and stems of grasses (wheat, possibly rye, and millet), stone querns, pestles, hoes, horn reapers, numerous sickles, and storage pits for grain in dwellings. Naturally, this being the Steppe, grass pollen was discovered in palynological analyses. Judging by the scope of production, plow rather than hoe cultivation was practiced. Farming was quite important in the forest-steppe and insignificant in the Steppe. At Steppe settlements there was a lack of storage pits for grain and a smaller quantity of agricultural implements, and the location of some settie-ments was in the open Steppe, characterized by wormwood (artemesia) and saline soils.
The fundamental basis of the economy was livestock husbandry. In the Timber-Grave Culture, the herd consisted of cattle and sheep or goat, horse, and, in much smaller numbers, pig (Tsalkin 1958; Arkheo-logiya 1985). In the Andronovo Culture, the pig was completely absent. Analysis of the osteological materials from the Elenovsky area allowed V. I. Tsalkin (1972b) to establish that the Andronovo Culture population bred horses both as transport and food animals. Discoveries of bone devices, possibly designed for milking mares, and beaker-form vessels, suggest the possibility of the invention of kumiss.
The Andronovo Culture, for the first time in the world, developed three breeds of horses: (1) the small horse, 128-136 cm high at the shoulder, similar to modern Kirghiz horses; (2) the middle-sized horse, 136-152 cm high at the shoulder, weighing 350 kg (these were already present in the Sintashtian sites and clearly predominant in the herd); and (3) the tall, highbred, gracile horse, 152-160 cm at the shoulder, employed as draft-animals for the chariots. The latter were used in sacrifices, placed in the burials of warriors, and represented in numerous petroglyphs. Horses of this elite breed may be the ancestors of the modem “Akhal Teke” horses and of Thoroughbred racers bred from them. A sophisticated level of horse breeding is a distinguishing feature of the Andronovo livestock economy, and it determines the outstanding role the Andronovo Culture peoples played in the history of Eurasia (Kuzmina 1997b).
Another peculiarity of Andronovo livestock husbandry is the presence in the herd of the Bactrian camel. This was domesticated in the late fourth millennium B. C. in Southern Central Asia 2md, possibly, in Iran, a conclusion validated by osteological materials and by figures of Bactrian camels harnessed to vehicles (Kuzmina 1963a; 1978b; 1983; 1994c). In the Andronovo Culture, its use is documented by the presence of camel bones (Alekseevka, Arkaim, Atasu, Ust’-Narym, and Pe-trovka II), by ritual burials (Aksu-Ayuly, Telzhan-Kuzeu, Mily-Kuduk, and Begazy), by a small figure (Ushkatta), and by representations of camel-drawn vehicles in petroglyphs.
Cattle and sheep/goat occupied the central place in the herd. According to V. I. Tsalkin’s data, members of both the Timber-Grave and Andronovo cultures raised cattle of the Eastern European breeds: long-homed massive bulls 126 cm high at the shoulder and weighing 350 kg and large sheep 73 cm high and weighing 50 kg.
The osteological materials show essential regional differences in the herd composition: in the forest-steppe, catde prevail; in the Steppe, sheep or goat. (At the Andronovo sites in the forest-steppe, catde make up 37-52% of the herd and sheep or goat, 37-44%; in the Steppe, 26-34% and 50-63%, respectively.) However, although the sheep is more prolific, producing up to seven lambs a year, in the Steppe, cattle prevailed in the actual herds. When we take into account the weight of individuals of different species, it appears that the Andronovo Culture population’s meat supply was composed of 60-70% beef, 20-30% horse, and only 10% mutton.
The first authentic evidence not only of beef catde breeding, but of dairy catde breeding, also comes from this period, documented by the analysis of the contents of pots from the Elenovsky area burial grounds and by the emergence of vessels with holes designed for cheesemaking.
In the fifteenth to thirteenth centuries B. C., very orderly methods of keeping livestock were apparent. Data from a number of settlements show that young animals were used mostly for food: 50% of the individuals slaughtered were under two years of age, 75% under three. An important achievement was keeping cattle stalled; the emergence of this practice is validated by the layout of many Timber-Grave and An-dronovo dwellings that have a fenced-off chamber with organic remains on the floor.
The emphasis on using cattle for both beef and dairy secured a stable beef-and-dairy diet for the society, and this led to population growth and a demographic explosion. This form of livestock herding suggests that the economy was settled, with the catde returning every evening to the settlement for milking. This sets a limit to the possible extent of the radius for pasturage for the livestock population, for in the Eurasian Steppe 1 sq. km of pasture can feed six to seven head of large ungulates, at the most.
Pastoral activities may be in conflict with limited environmental resources. First, the constant growth of the population requires more and more food, i. e., a bigger livestock population. Second, even with the most rational system of using pastures radially over a year, in which the herd is constantly driven within a range of several kilometers around the settlement, in the course of twenty to twenty-five years over-grazing of the steppe occurs, and the productivity of pastures falls by a factor of two to four. Their regeneration takes approximately half a century (Mordkovich 1982, 186-88).
These factors necessitated the movement of the Timber-Grave and Andronovo settlements to a new location several dozen kilometers away every twenty to twenty-five years, which accounts for the fact that the archaeological components of the Steppe setdements represent a single occupation, relatively small. Also, the burial grounds of these setdements have relatively few burials, each containing people of only one generation. The demographic analysis of the Elenovsky area sites, comparing the amount of dwelling area at the setdements with the number of burials in the corresponding burial ground (and taking into account the average lifespan in Andronovo society, which, according to V. P. Alekseev, was about thirty years), shows that the settlement and the burial ground probably functioned from twenty-five to fifty years (Kuzmina 1974b; Evdokimov 1984).
In the fifteenth to thirteenth centuries B. C., such ecological limitations resulted in society’s extensive transition, by iheans of territorial
Expansion and the development of new ecological niches in foothills and deserts, facilitated by the domestication of the camel. The constant pressure of the surplus population stimulated the gradual expansion and development of new territories. This explains both the large quantities of fifteenth - to fourteenth-century B. c. sites in the Steppe zone, and the territorial expansion of the Timber-Grave and Andronovo cultures, archaeologically well documented.
The Timber-Grave peoples occupied the whole Steppe and forest-Steppe zone; on their border with the forest, they influenced the formation of the Prikazanskaya Culture (Khalikov 1969). Some small Timber-Grave groups forced their way to the Danube Region (the late “Ocher burials” group), and others penetrated into Central Asia, evidenced by burials in the Yangi-Yul’ oasis in Tashkent, Orekhovskoe, the burial grounds of Patma-sai, Karalemata-sai, and Parau in Western Turkmenistan (Kuzmina 1963c; 1988; 1994c; Kuzmina, Vinogradova 1996; Mandelshtam 1966), and participated in the formation of the Tazabagyab Culture in Khorezm (Itina 1977).
The Andronovo peoples of the. Alakul type populated the Southern Urals and a considerable part of Kazakhstan (except Eastern Kazakhstan), reaching Southern Siberia (the Ermak burial ground near Omsk) (Map 11; Figs. 24-25). The Andronovo peoples of the Fedorovo type settled in the territory from the Urals and the greater part of Kazakhstan (except Western Kazakhstan) up to the Yenisei, and in Siberia they advanced into the forest zone (Komarova 1962; Kuzmina 1985; 1994c; Maksimenkov 1978; Matyushchenko 1973a; Molodin 1985; Vadetskaya 1986), where they influenced the establishment of the food-producing economy and the development of the Andronovoid cultures (Kosarev 1981; Obydennov 1986; Obydennov, Shorin 1995).
The discovery of such sites in the Tian Shan and the Pamirs testifies to the development of a new ecological niche, namely, the highlands. The Andronovo influence, mediated by the tribes of Xinjiang and Northwest China, can be traced all the way down to Anyang in the Henan Province (Kozhin 1977; Kuzmina 1973b; Antonova 1988; Vare-nov 1989).
In the sixth stage—the thirteenth or twelfth to ninth centuries B. C.— the economic crisis was aggravated by an ecological one. A considerable cooling of the climate occurred. The territory of a number of the Timber-Grave and Andronovo settlements of the developed stage, situated on the first terraces above the flood plain, was blocked now by river banks and inundated with spring floods.
As has already been mentioned, the complex economy, with its settled domestic livestock breeding, confined the growth of the herd to the size of the nearest pastures, which hampered the further development of this type of economy. The solution to the crisis lay in the more productive type of livestock husbandry, namely, the driving-to-pastures (or jailau) method. Under the driving-to-pastures system of livestock herding, the herds are driven off to remote pastures, and every season the pastures are changed, which enables an unlimited increase in the livestock population. This more progressive system makes it possible to harmonize the needs of the society with the possibiUties of different natural niches. Several types of seasonal nomadism are known: meridional, desert, vertical, and so on (Rudenko 1961). In some regions these types had already been established in the previous period. Meridional transhumance implies that in winter catde are driven off to the South, where it is warmer and the blanket of snow is thinner. (Horses are capable of getting fodder from under the snow, provided that the blanket of snow is under 0.5 m; sheep can also get fodder, along with horses.) The emergence of this form of transhumance is documented by late Timber-Grave and Andronovo sites in the Caspian Sea North Littoral and Transcaspia (Galkin 1992). Under the desert nomadic system, herdsmen drive their herds to the desert in early spring when it is watered and covered with vegetation. The existence of this form of transhumance is borne out by the finding in Khorezm of Andronovo-type ceramics over the abandoned dwellings of the Tazabagyab Culture (Itina 1977). The vertical form suggests that in spring the herds were driven to highlands covered with alpine plants and tall herbage (Mord-kovich 1982, 65-71).
Such sites are known in the Tian Shan (Arpa, and numerous burial grotmds of the Semirechye type) (Bemshtam 1952; Kuzmina 1970; Ga-lochkina 1977) and the Pamirs (the Yuzhbok biuial ground, etc.) (Lit-vinsky 1972) (Fig. 26). As a rule, stationary winter settlements are situated in foothills and in well-protected valleys on fertile sods, often in the vicinity of mines.
The distribution of Bronze Age sites in the Steppe, deserts, and highlands shows that herdsmen established optimal routes, taking into account the presence of water sources, subsoil water for digging wells, and mountain passes. Superimposing this map of the locations of Bronze Age sites on maps showing the routes of medieval and twentieth-century nomads brings one to the conclusion that the traditional paths were optimal (A. V. Vinogradov, Kuzmina, et al. 1973; Kuzmina, Lyapin 1984). These routes were also used for the movement of caravans. By tracing the origins of their operation, it can be inferred that the precursors for the Great Silk Road routes began as far back as the Bronze Age.
The new form of economy was furthered by the selection of a herd fit for migrations. It was composed of specialized breeds of horses and the Bactrian camel, with the pig either absent (the Andronovo Culture) or not playing any important role (the Timber-Grave Culture). Essential changes in the herd composition over time can be singled out: in the Late Bronze Age the sheep population increased (Shortandy-Bulak: by 81%), and the horse numbers doubled (Tsalkin 1972b; S. Ya. Zda-novich 1981). These animals are the best for the nomadic economy, for they are capable of getting fodder from under the snow.
Another important condition for the transition to mobile livestock husbandry in the twelfth to ninth centuries B. C. was the invention of a light framework dwelling, the protoyurt (Orazbaev 1970; Narynov 1980; Kuzmina, Livshits 1987). Traces of such round or square small dwellings have been discovered throughout the Steppe.
The diird important factor was the emergence of horseback riding linked to fighting. Spindle-shaped hone cheek-pieces, both three-hole ones vnith the holes in two planes (Kirovo, Ilyichevka, Volynska Greblya, Atasu) and three-hole ones with the orifices in one plane (De-reivka, Usatovo, Subbotovo, Zhirnokleevka, Yazevo, Shortandy-Bulak, Kent) date from the thirteenth-twelfth centuries B. c. and from the ninth to seventh centuries B. c. at Sialk VI, Hasanlu (K. F. Smirnov 1961; Leskov 1971; I. I. Sharafutdinova 1982; Margulan 1979; Varfolomeev 1988). They have broad analogies in the West. There is a mold of a bronze cheek-piece of this type at the settlement of Dalverzin; actual cheek-pieces are found in Iran (Giyan 1, Sialk VT, Hasanlu). They were designed for harnessing a horse for riding. Extensive evidence of the spread of the new fighting method in the ancient East is also recorded in this period.
The first riders represented in the monumental art of the ancient Near East were those in scenes of the battle of Kadesh, in Tell el Amarna and Saqqara, dating back to the fourteenth century B. C. (Schafer, Andrae 1925, 381; Yadin 1963, 219-24). In the Hittite army, the emergence of riders is attested by a relief from Zincirli and a seal from the Louvre (Meyer 1953, 32; Herzfeld 1937-38, 51). But it was only from the late twelfth century B. c. that detachments of riders began to play an important role in ancient Eastern armies. The quantity of representations of riders in art gradually grew, reflecting the growth of their role in troops (Kuzmina 1971; 1973a; Azzaroli 1985).
From the twelfth century B. c. armed riders were known in Assyria (Handicock 1912, 355, pis. XVII-XVIII; Meissner 1920, 217-19; Yankovskaya 1956, 44; Ebeling 1951; Kammenhuber 1966; Saggs 1963; Hanfmann 1961). From the turn of the second to first millennium b. c., mounted warriors formed part of the Israelites’ army (the Bible, 1 Kings 5: 4, 26). In Tell Halaf a relief representing a rider was found (Yadin 1963, 284-86).
In the Assyrian army mounted warriors were divided into those wielding lances and those wielding bows (VDI 1951: 2: 296, 299; 3: 330). In the early first millennium B. C., representations of lances appeared in monumental art: in the reliefs of the palaces of Shalmaneser II in Khorsabad and of Ashurbanipal in Nineveh, in the murals of the palace of Shalmaneser III in Til Barsip (Layard 1849, 1852; Botta, Flan-din 1849-50; Thureau-Dangin, Dunand 1936; Yadin 1963, 415-17, 442-43, 450, 451), and also in glyptics (Herzfeld 1937-1938, 50, 51).
These innovations developed slowly in the economy of the Steppe peoples. Only in a complex economy could they establish the driving-to-pastures method. These data, contrary to the opinion of M. P. Gryaz-nov (1957) and G. E. Markov (1973), show that the transition to mobile pastoralism did not have the character of a spontaneous leap but was a long natural process caused both by the specifics of the Steppe ecology and the whole course of the evolution of pastoralism, which lasted for centuries. This process ultimately resulted in the establishment in the Scythian period of the mobile form of pastoralism—nomadism.
World History
