UNDERGROUND BURIALS OF THE ANCIENT SAMUNIS-MINGECHEVIR

Abstract

The present paper is devoted to the analysis of archeological excavation as a result of researches discovered in the Mingechevir conducted in the middle of the XXth century of the diferent type of underground burilas of the ancient period. These burials are covered the significant historical period from the second half of the 1st millenium and the first century AD and are the important source of the scientific information on many issues of material and spiritual culture of the population of Caucasus Albania.

Underground burials of the ancient period in the Mingechaur zone by the method of placing the deceased in them are divided into three types: 1) burials with a backbone stretched out on the back; 2) burials with a weakly crouched skeleton on the left or right side; 3) burials with a heavily crouched skeleton on the left or right side.

The article gives a detailed analysis of all these three types of burials. The author of the article, along with a number of other researchers come to the conclusion that the first type of underground burial is considered to be innovation for the whole of the South Caucasus and its emergence is associated with the penetration of mobile tribes from the North Caucasus in particular the Scythian. Part of these Scythians finally settled in the Mingechevir zone and subsequently merged with the local population, which eventually leads to the appearance of a second type of underground burial in the form of underground graves with poorly crouched skeleton. The third type of underground burial of Samunis-Mingechevir of the ancient period, namely burials with a heavily crouched skeleton belong to local autochthonous tribes, consolidation of which became the basis for the formation of the state of Caucasian Albania in the IV–III centuries BC. This type of underground burial has deep local roots and is based on a centuries-old local funerary rituals.