The specificity of the scythian panoply of the lower danube

Abstract

The archaeological landscape of the Lower Danube was changing with the importance of the Danube itself, which either became, or a cultural watershed, or an artery, connecting the ancient communities. In the Early Iron Age, it seems that the Danube did not become an invincible barrier for the spread of offensive weapons of Scythian origin. Moreover, Dobruja itself looks like a territory mastered by the Scythians, starting from the Archaic period. The Lower Danube group forms a separate “steppe” cultural assemblage together with the Lower Dniester, South Carpathian and South Danube groups, for which the spear became the main type of weapon. However, these preferences were reflected in the morphology of the Scythian akinakes. So, for this steppe or Danube enclave, swords are more characteristic than daggers. Daggers are connected mainly with the forest-steppe part of the Carpathian-Dniester region and Transylvania. The warrior graves of the Lower Danube region mainly belong to the Classical Scythian period, while the only exception is related to the right bank of the Lower Danube. However, there are no burials with akinakai and even stray finds in Classical time outside the steppe. The main funeral practice is the burial mound and inhumation (one exception of cremation was recorded to the west, in northeastern Bulgaria, near Branichevo). In Late Classical time (350-300 BC) the Scythian akinakes also evolves in the steppe: an original series of single-edged akinakai of the Chaush type appear; besides that, Thracian combat knives are borrowed. Then the Scythian akinakes dissolves with the disappearance of the Classical Scythian culture at the turn of 4th-3rd centuries BC. Something similar happens a century earlier in the forest-steppe between the Dniester and Siret rivers. The complete disappearance of akinakes dates back there in the late 5th century BC. Thus, in the Scythian time, the Lower Danube becomes kind of frontier, or the territory, where cultures meet, clash, and grapple with each other, often in contexts of highly asymmetrical relations of power.