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Golden Warrior: Treasures of Saka Barrows
28 May, 2002 - 28 July, 2002
On 28 May, 2002, in Apollo Room of the Winter Palace opened an exhibition
from the collections of the Presidential Culture Center of the Republic
of Kazakhstan (Astana), Museum of Gold and Precious Metals of the Republic
of Kazakhstan (Astana) and Central State Museum of the Republic of Kazakhstan
(Almaty). Prepared by the State Hermitage Museum jointly with the Ministry
of Culture, Information and Public Agreement of the Republic of Kazakhstan,
it marks the Days of Culture of the Republic of Kazakhstan in the Russian
Federation. The exhibition shows ancient golden decorations of early nomads
unearthed in Kazakhstan.
The period when these things were created bears the conventional name
of Scythian-Saka epoch, derived from the names of the two basic tribal
groups that occupied the steppes of Eurasia. Blending of the Scythian
and Saka cultures generated in the 7th-8th centuries B.C. the so-called
animal style. Numerous golden decorations of the Sakas have been found
in Kazakhstan, these are plates, straps and pendants with stylized figures
of animals (tigers, elks, snow leopards, horses, wild rams, eagles, etc).
Excavation of the Issyk barrow near Almaty in 1969-1970 revealed an opulent
burial which tentatively dates to the 5th or 4th centuries B.C. (though
a later time, the 2nd century B.C., has been recently suggested). The
tomb contained a few thousand golden plates and straps which decorated
the clothes, headgear and weapons. Golden things were executed in various
techniques, hammering, stamping, engraving, etc. Animal figures are dynamic
and expressive. The burial was so well preserved that a reconstruction
of the Saka aristocrat's costume proved possible. Things yielded by this
burial complex, called ''Warrior in Golden Attire'', are presently distributed
among a few museums in Kazakhstan. This original work of ancient jewelers
is a successful combination of utilitarianism and creativity and a surprising
synthesis of humankind's functional culture.
Another richest treasure of Saka jewelry was found in 1986 in the Almaty
Region, the so-called Zhalaulinsky hoard.
In the 3rd-2nd centuries B.C. the animal style gave way to the polychromic
(or encrustation) style. Colorful inserts from precious and semiprecious
stones became widespread. The most remarkable collection of polychromic
artifacts was unearthed in the Kargaly ravine near Almaty in 1939; it
included the so-called Kargaly diadem (2nd-1st centuries B.C).
Alongside the reconstruction of the costume of the ''warrior in golden
attire'' including over four thousand elements, the exhibition shows original
things like golden plates in the form of trefoils and tiger heads, rectangular
straps for girdles and headgear, pendants in the form of snow leopards,
tigers, horned and winged horses, birds and mountains with the tree of
life, spiral torque, earring with pendants, signet ring with a man's head,
finger ring with a big oval protruding decoration, sword hilt and iron
dagger with a sheath coated with golden sheets.
This and other jewelry showed in the exhibition is just a fraction of
the ancient golden decorations created by anonymous masters of the past
centuries which attest to the uniqueness of the Kazakh people's cultural
heritage.
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Golden Warrior
Fifth-fourth centuries B.C.
Larger view
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