Research in Dzhetyasar tract

The detachment of the Khorezm expedition of the Institute of Ethnography of the USSR Academy of Sciences continued excavations of the ancient Dzhetysar 12 settlement in the lower reaches of the Syr Darya, begun in 1979. The central and northern parts of the upper platform of the ancient settlement were uncovered by a continuous area. After clearing and removing buildings from the upper construction periods, excavation continued within individual excavations and sections. All compartments of the first arched corridor with loopholes were excavated, laid during the second arched corridor and further restructuring of the fortress walls. The remains of the second shooting corridor, in turn, rebuilt several times, have survived only on the northern and eastern sections of the upper platform. In the last period of the monument's existence, the second shooting corridor, protected by new fortress walls, like the earlier one, served as living quarters and storerooms-granaries.

The first vaulted shooting corridor at a certain stage of the monument's life was built (in separate sections) between the protruding towers dating back to an earlier building period. Like the first shooting corridor, the towers covered with vaults were two-story and, in turn, were attached to the original fortress wall that encloses a small oval fortress. Presumably, the upper platform had no more than five towers, while two western towers flanked the main entrance. Three repeatedly rebuilt towers have been excavated according to the levels of the upper floors. Research has also begun on the vaulted ceiling of the first floor of the northern tower. The entire inner area of ​​the fortress is divided by a meridional central corridor and compartments extending from it at right angles into closed two- and three-room sections with flat ceilings and smoked coatings of high thin brick walls. Inside the sections, the rooms were rebuilt many times, changing the size and configuration but keeping the same interior details. The sections changed in different construction periods, including rooms located at different levels and connected by steep, narrow stairs. Similar stairs connected the living quarters with the compartments of the shooting corridor.

Among the finds at the settlement, in addition to a lot of ceramics, we note a significant number of wood and bone items. Among the latter, we mention a petiolate trihedral arrowhead, blanks of bullet-shaped arrowheads, rings, beads, as well as a buckle from the backbone of a large fish.

Several burial structures were unearthed to the east and northeast of the ancient Dzhetysar 12 settlement. They are circular ditches, not closed on the southwestern side, with grave pits in the center, located in two parallel rows, elongated from east to west. Above-ground structures, perhaps burial mounds, have not been preserved. The graves are oriented along the long axis from north-northeast to south-southwest. Small hemispherical writings for inventory were cut down in the eastern, longitudinal wall of the pit. Burials were made at the bottom of the pits on a bed of reeds and reeds in an extended position on the back, with the head to the north-northeast and were covered with reeds, reeds and wood. The inventory included vessels, beads, bronze, and iron buckles, and ram bones. Vessels from burials are similar to ceramics of the settlement.