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Scythians in the Steppe P2 - The ice maiden from Siberia - With Dr Gino Caspari (S01E03)
94 Plays3 years ago
This episode is one of the major reasons why I decided to start recording a podcast in the first place. We will remain with prehistoric nomadic steppe tribes, which are attributed to the umbrella term of Scythians, but shift our focus, from present day Ukraine, some 5000 km to the east, to one of the most remote regions on earth, the Siberian region of the Altai mountains. There, over two-thousand-year-old mummies have been discovered, perfectly preserved in ice. These frozen individuals were covered in amazingly detailed tattoos and allowed for remarkable research. So, I hope I’ll be able to give you an account of why I’m so fascinated by these mummies, and then, we’ll continue our conversation with Dr. Gino Caspari and talk about his experiences, excavating grave mounds in remote regions in Siberia.
Reverences:
· Simpson/Pankova Eds. (2017), Scythians. Warriors of ancient Siberia
· Liesowska (2014), Iconic 2,500 year old Siberian princess ‘died from breast cancer’, reveals MRI scan
· Siberian Times (2012), Siberian Princess reveals her 2,500 year old tattoos
· Badenkov (2006), The Frozen tombs of the Altai mountains
· Polosmak (1996), Menschen aus dem Eis Sibiriens
· Rudenko (1970), Frozen Tombs of Siberia
Links: 23minarch.com
Support: patreon.com/23minarch
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Transcript
Introduction to Scythians
00:00:09
Speaker
Scythians in the Steppe, Part 2. The Ice Maiden from Siberia.
Inspiration Behind the Podcast
00:00:15
Speaker
Alright, welcome back everybody to 23-Minute Archaeology with me, Noah. This episode is actually one of the major reasons why I decided to start recording a podcast in the first place.
Discovery of Ancient Mummies
00:00:30
Speaker
We will remain with prehistoric nomadic steppe tribes, which are attributed to the umbrella term of Scythians, but shift our focus from present-day Ukraine, some 5,000 kilometers to the east, to one of the most remote regions on Earth, the Siberian region of the Altai Mountains.
00:00:53
Speaker
There over 2000 year old mummies have been discovered perfectly preserved in ice. These frozen individuals were covered in amazingly detailed tattoos and allowed for some remarkable research.
00:01:10
Speaker
So I hope I'll be able to give you an account of why I'm so fascinated by these mummies.
Interview with Dr. Gino Kaspari
00:01:18
Speaker
And then we will continue our conversation with Dr. Gino Kaspari and talk about his experiences excavating grave mounds in remote regions in Siberia. Here's already a teaser.
00:01:32
Speaker
Permafrost burials are fairly frequent occurrence higher up in the mountains like on the Okok Plateau in the Altai Mountains. And we didn't really expect finding layers of ice at such a low altitude.
00:02:08
Speaker
Before
Kurgan Construction and Preservation
00:02:09
Speaker
we can discuss the mummy of the ice maiden, however, we need to recap how these ancient people from the Eurasian steppe constructed their burial mounds, because these so-called kurgens are key in why some of the buried individuals got frozen and preserved in ice.
00:02:31
Speaker
First, a wide trench was dug several meters below the surface and a wooden chamber made of piles was constructed. This grave chamber was afterwards covered with a stone packing of rubble and rocks. To give the grave mound its distinctive form in the otherwise rather flat landscape, enormous amounts of soil were collected and a hill raised above the stones.
00:03:00
Speaker
This soil isolated the stone packing and thus shielded the inside of the hill from the outside temperatures. In spring, melt water could flow through the earth and stones into the grave chamber.
00:03:17
Speaker
And at the same time, the earth and stones insulated the inside of the mound and reflected the sunlight in the summer, meaning that the meltwater which froze in the cold winter did not unfreeze even when the temperatures outside were well above 20 degrees Celsius.
00:03:38
Speaker
So, thanks to the construction and the relatively short summer in the Siberian steppe, a zone of permafrost was created below the stone packing. Due to this extraordinary fact, the bodies of the buried individuals and their organic grave goods in the burial chamber have been phenomenally preserved, frozen for many centuries.
Ice Maiden Discovery
00:04:04
Speaker
With that in mind, we go to one of the most remote places on Earth, the Ukok Plateau in the Altai Mountains, in the border region between Russia, Mongolia, China and Kazakhstan.
00:04:20
Speaker
The plateau is in an altitude of some 2500 meters above sea level and nowadays best accessible by helicopter. However nomadic steppe tribes have used it for passage through the mountains for many centuries.
00:04:37
Speaker
And there, the now famous mummy of the so-called ice maiden or princess from Ukok was discovered in 1993 by the Russian archaeologist Dr. Natalia Polosmak during a scientific expedition in the context of an international research program devoted to studying the local Iron Age culture.
00:05:02
Speaker
Upon discovery, big ditches indicated that the burial mount had already been looted. But Natalia Polosmak was optimistic and started with the excavation.
Life and Death of the Ice Maiden
00:05:16
Speaker
As expected from other kurgens, under the soil layer appeared a zone with permafrost. Under the ice, an untouched burial chamber made from large logs came to light.
00:05:30
Speaker
To get to the inside of the chamber, the archaeologists started melting the ice. The corpses of three horses appeared, some still equipped with colored felt saddles, perfectly preserved.
00:05:45
Speaker
The burial chamber contained a massive hollowed wooden log, which was itself filled with ice. After melting it, the remains of a young woman appeared. Thanks to the ice, she was also perfectly preserved and still wearing her clothes.
00:06:03
Speaker
A shirt made from Chinese silk and felt boots. Her head was completely shaved and she wore a wig made of horse hair and black felt. It was decorated with small golden figures of birds and a wooden carving of a deer.
00:06:24
Speaker
The research on the body of the mummy showed that the young woman died in the age of 25 to 28 years and her height was around 165 cm. She lived some 2500 years ago, making her, for example, over 400 years older than Julius Caesar or Cleopatra.
00:06:48
Speaker
As it was common for mummifying diseased individuals, for example in ancient Egypt, all the internal organs of the ice maiden were removed and the body cavity filled with herbs and roots. If you remember from last episode, also Herodotus told us that the Scythians from the Ukrainian steppe used this practice to mummify their dead.
00:07:16
Speaker
In 2010, an MRI scan was conducted on The Mummy by Andrei Latyagin and Andrei Savelov, both of the Siberian branch of the Russian Academy of Medical Science. It revealed the likely circumstances of her demise.
00:07:35
Speaker
During the imaging, it became evident that she suffered from breast cancer. A primary tumor was clearly seen in her right breast. The metastatic lesion of the lymph node was also visible.
00:07:50
Speaker
But the direct cause of her death is still difficult to determine, because different traumas were found, which the ice maiden suffered not so long before her death, like the dislocation of arm joints and fractures on her skull. These injuries
Medical Findings on the Ice Maiden
00:08:09
Speaker
look like she got them from falling, maybe the fall from a horse.
00:08:15
Speaker
Dr Natalia Polosmuk remarks that the ice maiden probably used some painkillers to cope with her injuries and the symptoms of her sickness. From written sources we know that ancient societies used wine, opium or cannabis. And actually in her burial chamber a container with cannabis was found.
00:08:41
Speaker
It was suggested that the consumption also altered her mind, giving her visions, leading her to be considered special, maybe seen as a shaman who could communicate with spirits. This would explain her special status and why she was buried in such an extensive manner. But of course, these are all only speculations.
00:09:08
Speaker
Thanks to all this research, it was possible to give an account of the months before and after the death of the ice maiden, even after 2000 years. When she arrived on the Ukok plateau, probably before or during winter, she was already in the fourth stage of breast cancer.
00:09:32
Speaker
She was in severe pain which was presumably treated by the consumption of cannabis. In such a bad condition she could have fallen off her horse, injuring her right shoulder, hip and hitting the right side of her head.
00:09:49
Speaker
but she survived the fall for some months because edemas are seen on her body. This displays that her kinsmen did not leave her to die, but cared for her and took her to the winter camp, also indicating her higher social status.
00:10:10
Speaker
Pathologists believe that her body was stored after the mummification for two to three months after her death. She was probably buried in the middle of June according to the plant remains that were identified in the stomachs of the three horses buried alongside her, assuming that they were killed during the funerary ceremony.
00:10:36
Speaker
This means that we can now even estimate that she died probably between January and March.
00:10:44
Speaker
In my opinion, we now come to one of the most fascinating aspects of the mummy of the ice maiden, her tattoos.
Scythian Tattoos Explained
00:10:54
Speaker
Since her skin was well preserved in the permafrost, depictions of mythical creatures were clearly visible on both her arms, from shoulders to wrists and even some on her fingers.
00:11:09
Speaker
One of the most famous and beautiful is placed on her left shoulder. It's in the before mentioned typical Scythian animal art style and shows a mythological creature, a deer with a griffon's beak and ibex antlers which seem to be decorated with leaves.
00:11:31
Speaker
Her other tattoos include a panther or snow leopard with a long tail on her arm and a deer's head with large antlers on her wrists.
00:11:44
Speaker
These highly artistic symbols on the body of the mummy were probably pierced into the skin with a needle and then a mixture of plants, suits and fat was robbed into the fresh wound. It was, however, not possible to establish at what time in her life she had her tattoos made.
00:12:06
Speaker
The patterns of her tattoos mirror the same fantastical creatures which covered the body of a male mummy excavated in the Pazurik Valley on the same Ukok plateau in 1929.
00:12:21
Speaker
The chest, arms, part of the back and the lower leg of the presumed quote warrior were covered in similar animals and mythical creatures. And you can call it experimental archaeology, but some years ago even I could not resist and had to get one of these fantastic ibex griffins tattooed as well.
00:12:43
Speaker
And now to finish our observations on this Siberian mummy, we come to a slightly different aspect regarding the more recent history of the Ice Maiden. The
Community Concerns Over Excavation
00:12:57
Speaker
interesting conflict which arose between the indigenous people of Altai and some Russian archaeologists.
00:13:06
Speaker
because apparently many locals had great objections when they heard about the disturbance and removal of human remains from their sacred burial mounds. For them every kurgen has its own spirit and thus the excavation of the ice maiden led to bad consequences like forest fires, illnesses, suicides and an increase of earthquakes in the Altai region.
00:13:36
Speaker
For those reasons, many wanted the ice maiden to be returned from the archaeological and ethnographic institute of Novosibirsk, some 600 kilometers to the north, and returned to her original burial site. For example, for Olga Kurtogashova, local Altai resident, it was clear what should happen with her remains. She said, quote,
00:14:04
Speaker
She may be a mummy, but her soul survives. And they say a shaman communicated with her and she asked to go home. That's what the people want too." As mentioned, since her discovery, the mummy of the ice maiden was mainly kept in Novosibirsk, apart from a period in Moscow when her remains were treated by the same scientists
00:14:32
Speaker
who also preserve the body of a certain Vladimir Lenin, who himself is on display in his mausoleum on the Red Square. It wasn't until 2012 when she was returned to Altay.
00:14:48
Speaker
Not to her burial place, however, but to the Museum of Gurnald Dijsk, where eventually she will be displayed in a glass coffin to visitors, causing further protest by local residents.
00:15:03
Speaker
Probably as a consequence to this dispute, the authorities of the Republic of Altai have declared the remote mountain region of Ukok, where the Ice Maiden was discovered, as a, quote, zone of peace, where no more excavations will be allowed.
00:15:23
Speaker
A counter-argument for further research offers Vyacheslav Molodyn, an archaeologist at the Siberian department of the Russian Academy of Science. For him, quote, the soul is somewhere else and we're studying the remains, so I don't see a violation of any accepted social rule here, end quote.
00:15:48
Speaker
Researchers reckon that there are hundreds of similar kurgens or burial mounds in the Altai Mountains, a potential scientific gold mine. Molodin believes that the decision to ban further excavations deprives the world an extremely valuable scientific archive.
00:16:10
Speaker
Further research is especially critical since global warming is slowly unfreezing the permafrost in the region. Without the protective ice, the ancient bodies will decay rapidly and their unique potential to answer research questions will be lost forever.
00:16:31
Speaker
It's an interesting discussion and I tried to offer the views of both sides, but how would you decide in this matter? Respect the will of the local indigenous peoples and leave the mummies in peace, or try to excavate and preserve them for future generations and further research.
00:16:54
Speaker
An interesting and very complex question, which leads us back to our discussion with Gino Kaspari about his experiences with excavating burial mounds in the Siberian steppe.
00:17:17
Speaker
All right, we continue our discussion with Dr. Gino Caspari and maybe you can set the scene a little bit. The kurgen you're currently excavating in Tunuk is located in the middle of a swamp and thus very difficult to access and excavate, I heard.
00:17:35
Speaker
Yes indeed so we're in a fairly remote area and in 2017 we undertook a first small expedition to southern Siberia to the valley of the Tsars in Tuva Republic and it is one of these areas where you have a lot of really large burial mounds.
00:17:57
Speaker
And in fact, some of the earliest evidence of what we consider Scythian material culture, meaning Scythian animal style weapons and horse gear all together in one tomb.
00:18:12
Speaker
And so in order to understand better where these cultural traits come from, we decided to actually conduct an excavation at one of these large early burial mounds that date to the 9th century BC, to almost 3,000 years ago.
00:18:33
Speaker
I
Role of Permafrost in Preservation
00:18:34
Speaker
touched upon the fact that, thanks to the construction of the Kurgan's permafrost formed around the grave chambers, preserving the mummies of the buried, with your current excavation campaign in Tunuk, are you expecting to see the same?
00:18:54
Speaker
permafrost burials are fairly frequent occurrence higher up in the mountains like on the Okok Plateau in the Altai Mountains and we didn't really expect finding layers of ice at such a low altitude but already in 2017 during preliminary excavations we actually hit
00:19:19
Speaker
a layer of frozen soil underneath the burial mound, which was extremely surprising to us because, as I said, we didn't expect this. And so everything now really depends on the question when this permafrost formed.
00:19:37
Speaker
And if it was really permafrost throughout the past 3000 years, because if that's not the case, then a lot of organic remains, of course, would have had time to decay.
00:19:53
Speaker
But what we know so far is that there is a layer of frost and it is stable throughout all of the year. So at least right now, we see that there would be a possibility for really well preserved organic remains.
00:20:12
Speaker
Is there any possibility of finding out when the ice, the permafrost formed? I mean, do you have like climate models that you can come back to or are there any other hints now from the first excavation campaigns that organic material was preserved that is ancient?
00:20:31
Speaker
Yes, I mean, in any case, we do have preserved organic materials. We have so far over 30 large logs up to 250 years of age that are excellently preserved. So there's not really a question if wood would be preserved. It's more a question whether finer organic materials like textiles or potentially even human tissue would also have survived.
00:21:00
Speaker
Regarding looting, in our last discussion you mentioned that you could assess traces of looting with satellite imaging. For the case of the Kurgan from the Ice Maiden of Ukok, apparently ditches also indicated that it was already looted, yet the chamber was more or less untouched. How do you evaluate potential sites and on what grounds did you decide to excavate the burial mound in Tunuk now?
00:21:31
Speaker
Given the high rate of looting and destruction of these burial mounds, you basically have to assume that a burial is already looted. If you have an absence of looting traces, that's a good first hint, but you have taphonomics, you have soil falling back in, you have stones covering things up again, and so there's a certain
00:21:56
Speaker
factor of uncertainty involved by judging a site just from the surface and trying to understand whether it's completely preserved and intact or it has been partially or fully destroyed.
00:22:11
Speaker
In our case we were first and foremost interested in this burial mound because it dated extremely early. It had a very interesting architectural feature with wood construction underneath that was up to this point unique. Now we have clay architecture which is absolutely unknown in the area and we have a lot of
00:22:38
Speaker
peripheral graves that are completely untouched. So even though some areas might have been impacted, which we don't really know and we don't really see traces of yet, we already are gaining a lot of information from just carefully looking at it, documenting it and slowly excavating it.
00:23:02
Speaker
I mentioned the complex discussion or conflict that arose between the local people of Altai and some Russian archaeologists on how to handle the remains of the mummy of the ice maiden. How are you dealing with the situation in Tunuk? Were there similar concerns by the local Tuva people regarding your excavation?
00:23:27
Speaker
Personally,
Indigenous Participation in Archaeology
00:23:28
Speaker
I think involving communities in archaeological work, especially when they're indigenous communities, is extremely important. Not only for them, but for the success of your project. First and foremost, if you want to successfully conduct a research project in such an area, you have to work with the people who live there.
00:23:54
Speaker
And so what I like about archaeology is that it's always also a cultural experience. So we employ local workers. We bring local school children to the site. We have local scouts that come and visit once in a while and help us out. We have nomads surrounding us who deliver cheese and milk and meat to our camp just
00:24:22
Speaker
for logistics, of course, because we need some food. And then, of course, they are incredibly interested in the results of our research, plus all the artifacts that we excavate do end up in the National Museum in Kizil and are therefore accessible to a local audience.
00:24:48
Speaker
All right. Yes. So thank you very much, Gino, for sitting down with me here. And I can only advise everybody to go and read your very interesting research and the papers you already published on the excavations in Tunuk. Definitely worth an episode coming up soon. And I wish you best of luck for your next excavation campaigns. Thanks so much.
00:25:21
Speaker
Okay, and with that we end our first look into the amazing research field of the Scythians, and I'm sure I won't be able to resist to revisit another aspect of this subject in the future. But for now, I hope you will tune in for the next episode called Meat for Warriors, where we will talk about the differences in the diet of Celtic individuals from the Iron Age.
Engagement and Support
00:25:51
Speaker
Again, on Instagram you will find pictures of the mummy from the ice maiden and her tattoos for example. Additionally, if you want to help to keep the podcast going, I would be very grateful for your support on Patreon.