Fatyanovo–Balanovo culture

The Fatyanovo culture emerged at the northeastern edge of the Middle Dnieper culture around 2800 BC,[1] and was probably derived from an early variant of this culture.[2] It is the chronologically latest and most northeastern culture of the wider Corded Ware horizon. It traces its origins from the west and southwest.[3]

The Fatyanovo culture has been described as a "genuine folk movement" from Central Europe in the Russian forests. Unlike other cultures of the Corded Ware horizon, the Fatyanovo culture is found beyond to borders of the earlier Funnelbeaker culture. The theory of the Fatyanovo-Balanovo culture being an intrusive one is based upon the physical type of the population (physical anthropology), flexed burial under barrows, the presence of battle-axes and ceramics.[4]

Some have argued that this culture represents the acculturation of Pit-Comb Ware culture people of this area from contacts with Corded Ware agriculturists in the West. Others have noted similarities between Fatyanovo and Catacomb culture stone battle-axes.[4][5]

The Fatyanovo culture runs from Lake Pskov in the west to the middle Volga in the east, with its northern reach in the valley of the upper Volga.[4] The Volosovo culture of indigenous forest foragers was different in from the Fatyanovo culture its ceramics, economy, and mortuary practices. It disappeared when the Fatyanovo people pushed into the Upper and Middle Volga basin.[2]

Spreading eastward down the Volga the Fatyanovo people discovered the copper ores of the western Ural foothills, and started long term settlements in lower Kama river region. They occupied the region of the Kama–Vyatka–Vetluga interfluves[6] where metal resources (local copper sandstone deposits[6]) of the region were exploited.[4] The metallurgy-based Fatyanovo settlements in this area gave rise to the Balanovo culture around 2300 BC.[1] Although being part of the Fatyanovo horizon, the Balanovo culture is quite distinct from it.[2] Ceramic finds indicate Balanovo coexisted with the Volosovo people (mixed Balanovo-Volosovo sites), and also displaced them.[6] The Balanovo culture became the metallurgical heartland of the wider Fatyanovo horizon.[2]

The Fatyanovo-Balanovo culture ends around 1900 BC.[1] On its southeastern fringes, the Balanovo culture had contributed to the formation of the Abashevo culture.[7][2][8][lower-alpha 1][lower-alpha 2] This culture would play an important role in the emergence of the Sintashta culture.[2]

Fatyanovo ceramics show mixed Corded Ware/Globular Amphorae traits. The later Abashevo culture pottery looked somewhat like Fatyanovo-Balanovo Corded Ware.[11]

Settlements of the Fatyanovo culture are scant, and bear evidence of a degree of fortification. The villages were usually situated on the high hills of the riverbanks, consisting of several above-ground houses built from wooden logs with saddle roofs, and also joined by passages.[6]

Hundreds of sites, including both settlements and cemeteries, have been found from the Balanovo culture. In Balanovo settlements, rectangular semi-subterranean houses are known. The absence of settlements are typical of the Corded Ware horizon, and are indicative of the mobile economy of the Fatyanovo-Balanovo people.[4]

The economy seems to be quite mobile, but then we are cautioned that domestic swine are found, which suggests something other than a mobile society. The Fatyanovo culture is viewed as introducing an economy based on domestic livestock (sheep, cattle, horse & dog) into the forest zone of Russia.[4]

The Balanovo also used draught cattle and two wheeled wagons.[6]

As is usual with ancient cultures, our main knowledge of the Fayanovo-Balanovo culture comes from their inhumations. Shaft graves were evident, which might be lined with wood.

Some three hundred cemeteries have been uncovered from the Fatyanovo culture. The largest of these contain more than a hundred burials. Some shaft graves are more than 2 m deep. The interments are otherwise in accord with Corded Ware practices, with males resting on their right side with their heads oriented towards the southwest, and females resting on their left side with their heads oriented towards the northeast. Grave goods included ornaments of animal teeth, pottery, polished stone battle-axes, and on some occasions stone mace-heads.[4] Fatyanovo burials have been found to include bear claws and pendants of bear teeth. Similar founds have been made in the earlier Sredny Stog culture, Yamnaya culture and Catacomb culture. Some have interpreted this as a sign that the bear had a ritual-symbolic function in the Fatyanovo-Balanovo culture.[12]

Balanovo burials (like the Middle Dnieper culture[2]) were both of the flat and kurgan type, containing individual and also mass graves.[6] The deceased were wrapped in animal skins or birch bark and placed into wooden burial chambers in subterranean rectangular pits. Burial goods depended on sex, age, and social position. Copper axes primarily accompanied persons of high social position, stone axe-hammers were given to men, flint axes to children and women. Amulets are frequently found in the graves.[6] Abashevo kurgans are unlike Fatyanovo flat cemeteries, although flat graves were a recognizable component of the Abashevo burial rite.[11]

Numerous skeletons from Fatyanovo-Balanovo cemeteries show evidence of injury, including broken bones and smashed skulls.[13] They were certainly a warlike people.[14] It appears that they at one point were in serious conflict with people of the Abashevo culture.[15]

Local metal objects of a Central European provenance type were present in the Fatyanovo-Balanovo culture. That these metal objects were produced locally suggests the presence of skilled craftsmen. Copper ornaments and tools have been found in Balanovo burials (Chalcolithic). The Fatyanovo-Balanovo people exploited metal resources from the western Urals.[4]

Spearheads of the Fatyanovo-Balanovo culture are similar to those of the later Sintashta culture, although the Sintashta ones were larger.[16] [14]