Research of the Kurgan Detachment

The Kurgan detachment of the South-Kazakhstan complex archaeological expedition of the Academy of Sciences of the Kazakh SSR researched the Otrar oasis and the Arys River's lower reaches.

In the Otrar oasis, the study of the early Muslim cemetery near the Kuyryk-tobe settlement and the burials of the 1st centuries AD near Altyn-tobe and Mardan-Kuyuk continued.

Excavations of the early Muslim cemetery revealed a relatively dense row of burials of the same type in rectangular crypts made of mud brick. The ceilings consisted of bricks installed obliquely across the sidewalls of the crypt. The buried lay on their right side or backs heads to the northwest, and faces to the south or up. Near separate groups of crypts, single khums, khumchas and other household vessels with children's bones were found. The studied crypts date back to the 11th-12th centuries. The absence of grave goods, the northwest orientation, and other elements of the funeral rites make it possible to consider them burials of early Muslims.

In the burials of the first centuries of our era, corpses were found inside ground pakhsa structures in the form of rectangular or oval crypts with a low "bath-like" burial chamber. The buried lay in an extended position, on their backs, with their heads to the south-southeast. Tools, jewelry and ceramics represent the inventory. Among the undisturbed children's burials were seven coins of the Early Han Dynasty (205 BC - 9 AD). On the front side of three of them, the designation of their weight has been preserved - “5 shu” (First issue of Wu-di 118 BC). The pottery found with the buried has analogies in the materials of early agricultural settlements in the Otrar oasis and dates back to the 1st-4th centuries.

In the lower reaches of the Arys River, in addition to systematic excavations of the mounds of the Borizhar burial ground, searches for new monuments were undertaken. Cave rooms were discovered both on the very territory of the burial ground and on the right bank of the Arys River. Premises (single-room and multi-room) were carved in the steep slopes of floodplain hollows and the high bank of the river, as well as in the thickness of the loess under the cultural layers of the settlements. The purpose of the structures (except one that can be considered a kitchen) is still unclear.

At the Borizhar burial ground, five mounds with burials inside ground burial structures made of pakhsa were excavated. Burial structures with corpses represent a rectangular enclosure with an entrance opening in one of the walls. For the first time in the Borizhar kurgans, accessories of belts with anthropo zoomorphic images on the shields were found.