Exploration and excavations in the Shymkent region

The Chimkent Pedagogical Institute and the Chimkent Regional Society for the Protection of Historical and Cultural Monuments expedition conducted exploration and excavations in the Chimkent Region. In the Lenger, Tyulkubas, Sairam, Bugun and Algabos regions, 217 monuments of different times were examined: petroglyph sites (two), burial grounds and sites of the Bronze Age (two), burial grounds of early nomads (62), single mounds (26), unfortified and fortified early medieval settlements (94), early medieval and medieval settlements (31). The topographic plans of the monuments were taken. Archaeological maps of the named areas have been compiled.

Excavations continued at the early medieval settlement of Altyntobe, located 15 km southwest of Chimkent (Bugun district). It is a rounded hill 10 m high, elongated along the north-south line. Its dimensions at the base are 150x90 m, the dimensions of the upper platform are 85x35 m. Three excavations (10x10 m) were laid in the central part of the settlement and a stratigraphic pit (12x4 m) in the eastern part. In all excavations and pits at a depth of 0.5-0.7 m, residential structures of the upper (first) building horizon were unearthed. 13 rooms have been fully or partially excavated. The walls, 0.5-1.0 m thick, were built of pakhsa and mud-brick (48x25x10 cm) and bear traces of plastering. On the floors of the premises, open-type hearths were cleared, sometimes - hearths-fireplaces in one of the walls, stone calculations. One of the rooms in excavation 2, subsquare in plan (4.2x4.0 m), had the floor carefully lined with small stones, pieces of ceramic slag, and fragments of khum-type vessels. Let us note the central room (6x4 m) in excavation 1, where three hums were found dug into the floor along the neck, hearths of an open type, and many fragments of vessels for various purposes, stone boat-shaped grain graters, heel stones near doorways.

Handmade dishes represent the pottery of the settlement (including 58 whole forms): khums, water-bearing and table jugs, kitchen and table pots, kitchen cauldrons, lids, mugs, horn-shaped coasters, small vessels. Leading elements of the ornament: finger impressions, scribbled corrugation, engobe streaks, relief roller (crumpled, dissected), less often - burnishing on an engobe of red-brown shades. We note the presence of signs on Altyntobe ceramics, some of which are repeated, an anthropomorphic relief image on the sidewall of the khum. A small female figurine was found. Bone items are rare. This is a bone style with a pommel in the form of a rooster's head (hoodoo?) and a box made from the joint of a large animal. In general, the archaeological material of the upper horizon of the settlement finds analogies in the monuments of the Kaunchin and Otrar-Karatau cultures of the middle reaches of the Syr Darya and is tentatively dated to the 6th-8th centuries.