Redvyntsi — the Funeral and Memorial Complex of a Rider of the Scythian Period in Northern Podillia

Abstract

In 1973, the archaeological expedition of Kamianets-Podilskyi Pedagogical Institute under the leadership of A. F. Hutsal and I. S. Vynokur investigated the mound no. 1 near Redvyntsi village in Khmelnytskyi District and Oblast, in the upper reaches of the Southern Buh basin. The graveyard of five mounds was located 0.5 km southwest from Redvyntsi, on the territory of the collective farm garden. The height of the embankments, located 50—60 m from each other, was 1.8—2.7 m, the diameter — 14—18 m. The height of the mound no. 1 (the biggest in the group), located in the eastern part of the burial ground, was 2.5 m, the diameter — 18 m. A burial and memorial complex was discovered under the mound: the cenotaph. It had a wooden structure with a diameter of 4.4 m. It was located on the top of the soil filling. In the centre of the layout there was a complex of items. On the side, traces of ritual hearths and ceramics near them were found. Among the finds, bridle items made of bronze should be noted. Moreover, there were plates that had the shape of a circle, a rosette and and a diamond. Buckles were found with them. Weapons include an iron spearhead and bronze three-bladed arrowheads. A glass bead was found among the jewellery. The finds have analogies in many areas of the Northern Black Sea region during the Scythian period: the Eastern Podillia group, the Dnipro River Right-bank forest-steppe region, the Ukrainian Left-bank forest-steppe, the Middle Don region and Steppe Scythia. Mound no. 1 in Redvyntsi, due to the lack of a burial, can be interpreted as a cenotaph: during the construction of which fire rituals took place, which have comparisons in the Ukrainian forest-steppe. According to analogies, the burial mounds in Redvyntsi can be dated by the 4th century BC. The significant size of the mound, as well as the rich inventory, indicate that it was built in the memory of an ancient warrior-horseman. The deceased, who could have died in a foreign land, probably belonged to the local nobility, and headed one of the communities of the Scythian period, which lived in the 4th century BC in the upper reaches of the Southern Buh.