Mannermaa Kristiina, Rainio Riitta, Girya Evgeny Yu, Gerasimov Dmitry V
Department of Cultures, Archaeology, University of Helsinki, P.O. Box 59, 00014 Helsinki, Finland.
Institute of History and Archaeology, University of Tartu, Jakobi 2, -206 Tartu, Estonia.
Archaeol Anthropol Sci. 2021;13(1):3. doi: 10.1007/s12520-020-01237-5. Epub 2020 Dec 15.
More than 4300 Eurasian elk () incisors, most of them pendants, were found in 84 burials in the Late Mesolithic cemetery of Yuzhniy Oleniy Ostrov, Northwest Russia. We analysed the manufacture techniques of elk teeth (4014), in the collection of the Peter the Great Museum of Anthropology and Ethnography, St Petersburg. A striking observation is that the manufacture of these pendants is similar in all burials. Teeth were worked by carving one or several grooves around the root tip. In addition to grooved ones, a number of teeth were not worked at all. The uniformity of the chosen species, tooth and techniques indicates that strict norms prevailed in the pendant industry. Despite the overall similarity, our study shows some variation in making pendants. A groove can cut the whole circumference of the root, or several distinct grooves can mark opposite sides of the root. Sometimes the grooves are deep and made carefully, and sometimes they are weak and made hastily. A typology of various groove types was created. In many graves, one groove type dominates. We interpret that this inter-burial variation and domination of one type resulted from personal choice and taste based on practicality. Such variation could also be associated with kin identifiers, but we did not find clear support for that in our study. Our study indicates that the groove types as such had no connection with particular ornaments, garments or hanging positions.
在俄罗斯西北部中石器时代晚期的尤日尼·奥列尼伊·奥斯特罗夫墓地的84座墓葬中，发现了4300多颗欧亚驼鹿的门齿，其中大部分是垂饰。我们分析了圣彼得堡彼得大帝人类学与民族学博物馆收藏的驼鹿牙齿（4014颗）的制作工艺。一个显著的发现是，这些垂饰的制作在所有墓葬中都很相似。牙齿是通过在根尖周围刻一道或几道凹槽来加工的。除了有凹槽的牙齿外，还有一些牙齿根本没有经过加工。所选物种、牙齿和工艺的一致性表明，垂饰制作行业存在严格的规范。尽管总体相似，但我们的研究表明，垂饰制作存在一些差异。凹槽可以切割牙根的整个圆周，或者几条不同的凹槽可以标记牙根的相对两侧。有时凹槽很深且制作精细，有时则很浅且制作仓促。我们创建了各种凹槽类型的分类法。在许多墓葬中，一种凹槽类型占主导。我们认为，这种墓葬间的差异以及一种类型的主导是基于实用性的个人选择和品味所致。这种差异也可能与亲属标识符有关，但我们在研究中没有找到明确的支持证据。我们的研究表明，凹槽类型本身与特定的装饰品、服装或悬挂位置没有关联。
