Brief ancient history of Donbass. The presented material can be used for class hours in a group. Recommended for class teachers of colleges and technical schools.

Ancient history of Donbass

Donetsk under the glacier

Ancient human sites testify that the Donetsk region began to settle down with people long before the appearance of the glacier, moving towards the Donbass from the northwest. The ice thickness of the giant glacier reached two kilometers, and it itself stretched from the British Isles to the Ob, approaching the Donetsk Ridge and descending in wide ledges along the Dnieper and Don.

If earlier lush palm trees and cypresses grew on the territory of Donetsk, then with the onset of the glacier they gradually gave way to tundra with dwarf birches and willows, mosses and cranberries in the swamps. Heat-loving animals died out or went to warmer climes. They were replaced by huge mammoths, woolly rhinos, reindeer, cave bears and bison. The remains of these animals were found on the Seversky Donets, near Konstantinovka, Druzhkovka, Gorlovka, Artemovsk and Mariupol.

Time passed and the glacier gradually melted, by the time the cold period ended, the climate of Donetsk became close to modern. Wild boars, bulls, horses, wolves and foxes appeared in the forest-steppe.

The first settlers of the Donetsk region

Man appeared on the territory of present-day Donbass even before the appearance of the glacier. This is evidenced by the found flint arrowheads and spears, needles, harpoons, throwing spears. Spacious huts made of skins stretched over a skeleton of bones were a haven for a whole family.

One of these sites was discovered six kilometers from Amvrosievka, in the upper reaches of the Kazennaya beam. Together with the remains of bonfires, flint and bone products, stone figurines of women have been preserved.

Gradually, man developed, learned to hunt and survive: he invented a bow and arrow, learned to fish.

The remains of the settlements of hunters and fishermen of those times in the territory of Donetsk and the region were found along the rivers Seversky Donets, Bakhmut, Volchya.

At the dawn of the Stone Age, man learned to grind, saw and drill stone. Axes, hammers and hoes were added to the former tools of labor. From hunting and collecting plant foods, people began to move on to raising livestock and growing plants.

In the Donetsk Regional Museum of Local Lore, objects of the sites of an ancient man near the Seversky Donets, Kalmius, Krynka are exhibited: polished maple-shaped axes, arrowheads and throwing spears, knives, scrapers, and the remains of pottery.

The tribes living in the Donts and Azov regions led a settled way of life. They were brought together by family ties, a common language, trade and the exchange of goods.

Cimmerians on the territory of the Donetsk steppes

The expanse of the steppe, running water, fresh grass for grazing beckoned the tribes in the Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov. The Cimmerians were the first to come to these steppes. They came here in the tenth century. BC e. because of the Don, they roamed near Kalmius and the Seversky Donets.

The history of this people continued until the second half of the 7th century BC, when it disappeared, dissolving among the population of Asia Minor. The material culture of the Cimmerians is similar to the tribes of the Scythian community, which ousted the Cimmerians from the Donetsk steppes in the 7th century. BC e.

Scythians

Accompanying huge herds of cattle, riding herdsmen roamed the Donetsk land for five centuries. Six-wheeled felt wagons, slowly moved by oxen, served as housing for many generations of Scythian cattle breeders.

The Scythians were known in antiquity as a nomadic pastoral people who lived in wagons, fed on milk and meat of cattle, and had cruel warlike customs, which allowed them to gain the glory of invincibility. They became the personification of barbarism, but left many legends. One of the most famous is the legend of the allegedly buried Scythian gold, which has haunted archaeologists for centuries.

Sarmatians and Huns

In the 2nd century BC, the Sarmatian tribes, who came from the Trans-Volga region, invaded the Donetsk steppes. They sought not only to expand, but also to seize pastures from the richer Scythians, to take possession of their slaves, expensive dishes and fabrics.

Even in the V-IV century. BC e. The Sarmatians were peaceful neighbors of the Scythians. Scythian merchants, heading to the eastern countries, freely passed through the Sarmatian lands. However, the 3rd century BC e. friendly relations were replaced by enmity and the military offensive of the Sarmatians on Scythia. The reason for this was the weakening of the Scythian kingdom. After the conquest of Scythia, the Sarmatians gained fame as one of the most powerful peoples of the ancient world. All of Eastern Europe, together with the Caucasus, was called Sarmatia.

In the 4th century AD, from the hot steppes of Asia, the Huns came to the Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov: nomads and cattle breeders. They ruthlessly destroyed the settlements of the Slavs, their crops and economy. The Huns tried to move north into the forest-steppe part, but they were stopped every time by the Slavic tribes.

Slavs

The core of the association of the East Slavic tribes were the Antes or "Dews", "Rus" as the brave people from the Ros River were called. From them, they believe, and received the name "Rus" - the early feudal state of the Eastern Slavs.

In the first half of the 11th century, new conquerors, Torks, came to the Donetsk steppes. The memory of their stay here is still preserved in the names of the rivers: Tor, Kazennyy Torets, Krivoy Torets, Dry Torets, as well as in the names of the Torsk lakes and settlements: the village of Torskoye, Kramatorsk. Like the Pechenegs, the Torques were the enemies of Russia.

Almost the entire territory of modern Donbass was part of the Crimean Khanate. To protect against Tatar raids and protect their southern borders, the Slavs built guard fortresses along the banks of the Seversky Donets. A shaft with loopholes of the Svyatogorsk fortress stretched along the crest of the chalk cliffs. In 1571, an earthen rampart encircled the Bakhmut watchman. And in 1645, a volley of forty cannons heralded the birth of a new fortress Tor (today it is the city of Slavyanogorsk).

In the 18th century, Empress Catherine II generously distributed the lands of our region to landlords, officials, officers, resettled Greeks from Crimea. On the Azov coast and the right bank of the Kalmius, the Greeks founded 24 settlements, which were given the names of their former cities and villages: Yalta, Urzuf, Stary Krym, Karan, Beshevo, etc.

In the summer of 1868, construction began on the "cast iron" - a railway that was supposed to connect Kursk and Kharkov with the Donbass and the Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov.

The 19th century was coming to an end, a new 20th century was on the threshold, which abruptly turned the fate of Donetsk.

The tribes of Cimmerians, Scythians, Sarmatians, Alans, Huns, Bulgars, Pechenegs, Polovtsy, and Torks roamed the Donetsk steppes.

The main occupation of nomadic tribes is cattle breeding and military raids. Some of the nomadic peoples were engaged in primitive agriculture. Nomads - several times a year they moved from place to place, because the animals constantly needed new pastures. Therefore, the most common type of dwelling among nomads was collapsible, easily portable structures covered with wool or leather (yurt, tent or tent). Household utensils and dishes were most often made of unbreakable materials (wood, leather, metal). Clothes and shoes were sewn, as a rule, from leather, wool and fur.

The nomads traveled on horseback and were excellent riders. In all nomadic tribes, all men were warriors and mastered the art of war from early childhood. Some tribes also had women warriors. The core of the army was the cavalry. The nomads used their traditional tactics of surprise attacks, feigned retreats and ambushes. The weapons of the riders were spears, bows and darts. , as well as daggers, swords and axes. The Scythians have already mastered some siege machines, primarily a ram. The Polovtsians had heavily armed cavalry, as well as heavy crossbows and "liquid fire".

All nomads were pagans. The burials of the dead were most often carried out in mounds. Clothes, weapons, jewelry, utensils were placed in the grave, often the remains of a horse were left on the grave or in the grave.

1. Huns (Xiongnu)- Turkic-speaking tribes who came from the East from Central Asia. A large number of gold and silver jewelry, belt sets, diadems, saddles, horse harness, weapons, headdresses, buckles, pendants, falars (falar is a large convex round plaque with a relief ornament) and overlays were placed in the graves of noble Huns. A stone stele from the Novoazovsky region dates back to the Hun times.

2. Bulgars- Turkic and Finno-Ugric tribes that inhabited the Black Sea and Azov steppes in the 7th century. In the Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov, they created their own state Great Bulgaria (Bulgaria) with its capital in the city of Phanagoria. Part of the population was engaged in agriculture, and the traditional occupation of the steppes - cattle breeding was also developing. As a result of pressure from Khazaria, part of the Bulgars went to Asia Minor, to Arabia, where over time they assimilated among the local population, part moved to the Caucasus (in particular, to Armenia), part of the Bulgars went to Europe and created a new state - Bulgaria on the Danube, part of the Bulgars remained on their lands and became part of the Khazar Khaganate.

3. Khazars- Turkic-speaking nomadic tribes. The Khazars conquered the Azov Bulgarians and created a strong, prosperous state - the Khazar Khaganate, headed by the ruler - the Khagan and the capital in the city of Itil. For a long time, both Byzantium and Russia paid tribute to the Khazars for maintaining peaceful relations. Before the founding of the state, they were nomads, and then began to lead a semi-nomadic lifestyle, staying in the cities for the winter. They were actively engaged in trade, although the Khazars did not have their own coin. The army of the Khazars was numerous and consisted of a permanent detachment and a militia. The Kiev prince Svyatoslav dealt a decisive blow to the kaganate. After that, the Khazar Khaganate could never recover and soon ceased to exist. Near the Seversky Donets, scientists discovered a large settlement from the time of the Khazar Khaganate. A set of jewelry, a mirror and coins were found in the burial of a Khazar woman in Mariupol. During the excavations, archaeologists found a set of pincers, tongs, stirrups, buckles, weapons, as well as the remains of the Khazar camps, in which traces of round dwellings - yurts are preserved.

4. Torquay- tribes of Turkic-speaking nomads related to the Pechenegs. The main nomad camps of the Torks were located in the Donetsk region in the basin of the Kazenny Torets River. From them comes a whole series hydronyms(names of rivers) - Kazennyy Torets, Krivoy Torets, Dry Torets, Torsk Lakes

and toponyms(names of the locality) - Bolshoy Tor, Toretskoye settlement and the city of Tor (modern Slavyansk), the villages of Toretskoye and Torskoye in Konstantinovsky and Krasnolimansky districts, Kramatorovka (modern Kramatorsk). It was in this steppe microdistrict that a few burials of Torks were found: near the village of Torskoye in the Krasnolimansky district and the city of Yasinovataya, Donetsk region. In many ways, they are similar to the Pechenegs. Torquay, like the Pechenegs, buried their relatives in mounds in pits with wooden flooring. On top of the flooring lay the head and legs of the horse. The horse itself was eaten by relatives during the feast (feast - commemoration). The horse was an obligatory element of burial. The nomads believed that the dead entered paradise on horseback.

5. Pechenegs - nomadic Turkic-speaking peoples. The Pechenegs were in constant motion and moved across the steppe with their herds. The basis of the herd were horses and sheep. They did not have long-term camps; light yurts served as dwellings. A yurt is a round dwelling made of felt and animal skins on a frame of wooden poles. An open hearth was always arranged in the center of the yurt. Predatory wars were an important way to get rich. The Pechenegs constantly attacked their neighbors, captured people for the purpose of ransom, and took their cattle away. Neighboring states sought to make peace with them and pay off tribute. The Pechenegs first appeared on the borders of the Russian principalities in 915. Prince Igor immediately concluded a peace treaty with them. Later, a long bloody struggle between Russia and the Pechenegs began, and only in 1036 Yaroslav the Wise managed to defeat a large Pecheneg army near Kiev and put an end to their raids.

6. Polovtsy - another name for Komans (or Cumans), Kipchaks (or Kypchaks). The whole Polovtsian land was called Desht-i-Kipchak. The center of the Polovtsian land was in the Northern Azov region. Russian chronicles call these lands Lukomorye. A large center of the Polovtsians from the Don were fortified settlements on the Seversky Donets near the villages of Bogorodichnoe, Sidorov and Mayaki in the Slavyansk region of the Donetsk region, the cities of Sharukan, Sugrov, Cheshuev are mentioned in their lands.

The Kipchaks were typical nomadic pastoralists. They bred horses, camels, goats and sheep, buffaloes and cows; in the warm season, the Polovtsians roamed the steppe. In cold weather, they arranged winter quarters. They consisted of yurts and wagons. An insignificant part of the Polovtsy settled on the ground and was engaged in primitive agriculture. The main foodstuffs were animal meat and cow's milk, koumiss (processed horse's milk), millet and wheat porridges. The clothes were well adapted for riding.

The life of the Polovtsy, like all nomads, was inextricably linked with the horse. All from young to old were excellent riders. after death, as a rule, a whole horse, a bridle set, stirrups, and sometimes a saddle were placed in the graves of men and women. Weapons were placed on the men, jewelry on the women. The dead were buried in pre-existing burial mounds or a new earth mound was raised over their graves.

The Kipchaks had a custom to set stone (very rarely wooden) images of dead ancestors on barrows and high places. These sculptures are called "stone women". The sculptures are made of gray sandstone and are 1 to 4 meters high. "Baba" is a distorted "balbal", "babay" (in Turkic - a strong, respected, warrior-hero). Polovtsian stone sculpture (Polovtsian woman) is a statue symbolizing an ancestor. Gifts were brought to stone "women", they were asked for protection and patronage.

Polovtsian warriors were considered excellent warriors.

1. All men capable of carrying weapons were required to serve in the Polovtsian army. Polovtsian warriors fought with bows, darts and curved sabers, lassoes and spears. The main force of the nomads, like any steppe dwellers, were detachments of light cavalry armed with bows. Later, squads with heavy weapons appeared in the troops of the Polovtsian khans. Heavily armed warriors wore chain mail, armor and helmets with iron or bronze masks.

2. It is also known about the use of heavy crossbows and "liquid fire" by the Polovtsians, borrowed, perhaps from China or from the Byzantines (Greek fire). Using this technique, the Polovtsy were able to take well-fortified cities.

3. The Polovtsian troops were distinguished by their maneuverability. Some carts were equipped with crossbows and were suitable for protection during enemy attacks. During sudden attacks by the enemy, the Polovtsy knew how to defend themselves stubbornly, surrounding their camp with wagons.

4. The Polovtsy used the tactics of surprise attacks, false retreats and ambushes, traditional for nomads.

Kochevse tribes on the territory of Donbass (material for the presentation).

This presentation can be used in geography lessons in grade 8 when studying the native land.

The duration of the existence of our technological civilization is only 300 years. Most of the history of mankind, including the history of Ukraine, Russia and Donbass, is the history of primitive society. After the "primitive" history, the second place in duration is occupied by the history of nomadic peoples. What part? About 5200 years! From IV millennium BC. e. until the 1860s AD e. But we know little about these peoples. And in vain. This is also an "interesting story".

KIMMERIYTSS

According to scientists, back in the 8th-7th centuries BC, Homer wrote about the Cimmerians, who are known to us from history as the most ancient nomadic tribe that lived in the Northern Black Sea and Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov, that is, within the current Donetsk region. The ancient Greek historian and traveler Herodotus speaks more definitely about the Cimmerians, who calls them the predecessors of the Scythians. In confirmation, he writes: "... and now there are still Cimmerian walls in Scythia, there is a Cimmerian crossing ..., there is also the so-called Cimmerian Bosporus (Kerch Strait)".

The Cimmerians led a mobile lifestyle and are known only from burials and treasures. They did not have their own villages. The dead were buried in the burial mounds of the Bronze Age, sometimes they erected their own mounds. In the early stages, the buried were always crouched, then elongated burials appeared.

The Cimmerian burial near the village of Chernogorovka in the Bakhmut district (part of the modern Artemovsky district), excavated at the beginning of the century by V. A. Gorodtsov, is especially famous. Bronze bits and all kinds of plaques were found here, a bronze head rim - a sign of a warrior. Cimmerian warriors wore a gold earring in their left ear. Burials of this time were also found near the villages of Luganka and Veselaia Dolina, Kamyshevakha of the Artemovsky district in the Donetsk region, as well as in the village of Elino near the city of Bryanka, the village of Bezhanovka near the city of Kirovsk, in Sverdlovsk and with. Klunnikovo Antratsitovsky district in the Luhansk region.

In the 7th century BC. the Cimmerian culture of the Northern Black Sea region is completely replaced by the Scythian. The Roman historian Plutarch writes about this event as follows: “... The Cimmerians, who first became known to the ancient Hellenes, were an insignificant part of the whole, which, in the form of being expelled by them as a result of indignation, under the onslaught of the Scythians, passed from Meotida (Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov) to Asia under leadership of Ligdamis.

Other researchers suggest that the Scythians, who ousted the Cimmerians, are spoken of in the biblical book of the prophet Jeremiah as barbarians, a people who “from afar ... a strong people, an ancient people, a people whose language you do not know, and you will not understand that He says. His quiver is like an open coffin; they are all brave people. And they will eat your harvest and your bread, they will eat your sons and your daughters, they will eat your sheep and your oxen, they will eat your grapes and your figs; they will destroy with the sword your fortified cities, in which you hope ... ”Scholars attribute this mention to the 7th-6th centuries BC.

SCYTHIANS

The most detailed and reliable written evidence about the Donetsk region of that bygone historical period and about the then population in it was left by the recognized father of history Herodotus, who lived in the 5th century BC: “... the nomadic Scythians who lived in Asia, being pressed by the war with sides of the Massagets (a Scythian tribe that occupied the lower reaches of the Syr Darya and Amu Darya in the 8-4 centuries BC, and in the 3-1 centuries became part of other tribal unions), crossed the Araks River and retired to the Cimmerian land (indeed, the country , now occupied by the Scythians, originally belonged, they say, to the Cimmerians).

According to Herodotus, the Scythians were divided into plowmen, nomadic cattle breeders and the so-called "royal", that is, ruling. By the way, it was he who first called Scythia the land from the Don to the Dnieper, including our region.

The large Scythian mounds studied near Mariupol and in other places amaze with the luxury of grave goods. The finds of Perederiyeva Mohyla (Snezhnoye) are unique. A golden pommel of a Scythian royal ceremonial headdress was found, which has no analogues in archeology. The shape of the object is ovoid and resembles a helmet, its weight is about 600 g. The dimensions of the product are: height - 16.7 cm, circumference at the base - 56 cm.

With education in the IV century. BC e. Scythian kingdom of Atea, the territory of the region became part of it and became one of the centers of settlements of agricultural and pastoral tribes.

Further, Herodotus wrote: “Beyond the river Tanais (Don) is no longer the Scythian land. The first of the plots of land there belongs to the Sauromates, which start from the corner of the Meotian Lake (Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov), occupy a space for fifteen days of travel to the north; in all the land there are neither wild nor garden trees.

The scientist Hippocrates, who worked a little later than Herodotus, also spoke about the similarity of these peoples: the Scythians did not have permanent dwellings, they literally lived on wheels - in wagons, moving from one place of good grazing to another with their herds of cattle, under shelter there were children and their mothers, and the warriors, whether male or female, spent most of their time in the saddle. The Scythian tribes were called "inhabitants of carts."

Sarmatians

The Sarmatians had much in common with the Scythians. The same Herodotus wrote that their women "ride on horseback to hunt with and without their husbands, go to war and wear the same clothes with them."

The Sarmatians invaded Scythia in the 2nd century BC, as evidenced by Diodorus Siculus: “The Sarmatians, having become stronger, devastated a significant part of Scythia and turned it into a desert ...” Interestingly, the Latin name of the territory of Donbass - Sarmatia is associated with the Sarmatian tribes. Therefore, the authors consider it rational to use the definition of Ruthenia Sarmatica as the Latin analogue of the term "Donbas Rus" as part of Pax Ruthenica - the big world of the Russian community.

The Sarmatians, according to ancient authors, were nomads. Their dwellings were tents and wagons. “Sarmatians do not live in cities and do not even have permanent residences. They live forever in camp, transporting property and wealth wherever the best pastures attract them or are forced by retreating or pursuing enemies ”(Pomponius Mela).

During the migrations, the Sarmatians transported their children, the elderly, women and property in wagons. According to the Greek geographer of the end of the 1st century BC. e. - the beginning of the 1st century A.D. e. Strabo: “The wagons of nomads (nomads) are made of felt and attached to the wagons on which they live, cattle graze around the wagons, whose meat, cheese and milk they feed on.”

Western Sarmatian tribes - Roxalans and Yazygs - occupied the steppes of the Northern Black Sea region. About 125 B.C. e. they created a powerful, although not very strong federation, the emergence of which is explained by the need to resist the pressure of the eastern Sarmatian tribes. Apparently, it was an early state typical of nomads, headed by a tribe of royal Sarmatians. However, the Western Sarmatians failed to repeat the state experience of the Scythians - from the middle of the 1st century BC. e. they acted as two independent unions. In the steppes between the Don and the Dnieper, the Roxolans roamed, to the west of them - between the Dnieper and the Danube - the tongues lived.

The Sarmatian culture is represented by materials from the burial of a wealthy Sarmatian woman in a mound near the village. Novo-Ivanovka of the Amvrosievsky district in the Donetsk region, silver neck torcs with gilding, gold pendants and rings, silver and glass bracelets, a bronze mirror, an iron knife, a bronze cauldron, horse harness. More than 45 Sarmatian graves, three treasures, about a dozen random finds are known in the Luhansk region. The most significant excavated monuments of the Sarmatian time were found near the city of Aleksandrovsk (Alexandrovsky burial ground), the village of Frunze (Sentyanovka), the village of Novobaranikovka, the city of Svatovo, the village of. Novosvetlovka and others. Near the city of Starobelsk in 1892 (Vodyanoy Yar beam, Podgorovka village) a treasure was discovered, since then it has been kept in the Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg.

The poem "Sarmatians 150 g."

Yuri Galkin

Steppe archers Sarmatians,

Behind the mane of a wild horse

The ferocious gaze of the shaggy head,

Rushed with sabers ringing.

Animal face, skin armor,

Frozen over the edge of the abyss,

In oblique rays from dust brown,

He glanced around the neighborhood.

The koumiss smell of a mare,

Stretched with smoke from distant yurts,

The river sparkles in a meander,

There is a whole herd of wagons in the steppe.

Inside the nomadic settlements,

War and brazen invasion

In the sad creak of the wheel.

And the whole renaissance

To the west poured from the valleys,

And the steppe is alive from movement,

Raging, moving on Rome...

ALANS

In the second century BC, a special place among the Sarmatian tribes was occupied by the Alans. The Alans are Iranian-speaking tribes that emerged in the 1st century BC. BC. from the environment of the semi-nomadic Sarmatian population of the Northern Caspian, Don and Ciscaucasia and settled in the 1st century. n. e. (according to Roman and Byzantine writers) in the Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov and Ciscaucasia, from where they made devastating campaigns to the Crimea, Transcaucasia, Asia Minor, Media.

Here is what the historian Ammian Marcellinus wrote about the Alans: “... young people, having become related to horseback riding from early childhood, consider it a shame to walk, all of them, due to various exercises, are efficient warriors. Almost all Alans are tall and handsome, with moderately blond hair; they are frightening with a restrainedly menacing look of their eyes, very mobile due to the lightness of weapons ... They consider the one who breathes his last in battle to be happy.

The last Alanian union of tribes in the history of Sarmatia in 375 was defeated by the nomadic tribes of the Huns. Part of the Allans was forced to submit to the Huns and take part in their further military campaigns, the other part went to the North Caucasus, mixed with local tribes and participated in the formation of the Ossetian culture.

GOTH

In the III century. the Germanic tribes of the Goths established their dominance in the Northern Black Sea region, having formed here the Gothic state - the Getics. its military expansion into the Balkans and Asia Minor.The political unification of the Goths reached its greatest power and strength in the middle of the 4th century AD under the reign of King Germanarich (332-375). After the death of the Gothic king, the military dispute with the Antes was continued by his heir Vinitary, who insidiously killed the prince of the Arti Bozh with his sons and 70 elders in 375. But the very next year, the Goths were defeated by the nomadic tribes of the Huns, who supported the Antes in their struggle against the Gothic state. After this crushing defeat, getika as a state quickly fell into a state of doc. Most of the population moved to the Danubian lands, a smaller part remained on the territory of the Crimean peninsula.

HUNS

So, in the 5th century AD, the Huns invaded the local area, causing panic even in the Roman Empire, not to mention the Sarmatians. The Christian writer of that time, Eusebius Jerome, wrote literally the following about this event: “Here, the whole East trembled at the sudden spread of news that from the extreme limits of Meotida, between the icy Tanais and the ferocious peoples of the Massagets, where the Alexander constipation (Derbent passage in the mountains near the Caspian Sea) held back wild tribes on the rocks of the Caucasus, swarms of the Huns broke out, who, flying here and there on fast horses, filled everything with carnage and horror ... May Jesus turn away such beasts from the Roman world for the future! They are unexpected everywhere, and with their speed, warning the ear, they spared neither religion, nor dignity, nor age, they did not spare crying babies.

Compared to other nomadic warriors, the Huns managed in our area for a short time. Under the leadership of Attila, they invaded Western Europe, but after the battle on the Catalaunian fields in Eastern Gaul, having suffered heavy losses, they were forced to retreat. And when Attila died, the union of the Huns completely broke up. After in the local limits, there was just no one!

And the Avars, and the Ants, and the Bulgarians, led by Khan Kubrat, and the Khazars, and the Arabs, and the Alans, and the Hungarians, and the Pechenegs, and the Torks, and the Cumans, and the Mongol-Tatars, and the Nogais ...

Yes, and it is quite understandable why the local lands attracted so many diverse peoples in all ages. Herodotus wrote about their wealth and attractiveness. And the Persian historian al-Juzjapi subsequently confirmed this: “In the whole world there can be no land more pleasant than this, air better than this, water sweeter than this, meadows and pastures more extensive than these.”

But back to the 5th century. The Huns erased almost all traces of settled life in the Northern Black Sea region. There comes a period when for the first time one can speak of the region as about the Wild Steppe. But the nomads did not pay attention to this "crossroads of peoples." Here, in turn, appear three peoples consonant, although they had nothing in common - Bulgarians, Avars, Khazars.

BULGARIANS, AVARs

Turkic-speaking Bulgarians opened this list. They accompanied the Huns, pouring into the gap formed after the defeat of the Sarmatians. The Huns went to the West - and the Bulgarians remained the main masters of the steppe. However, not for long. A new people appears - and makes a revolution in world history, comparable to the Huns. We are talking about the Avars, whose origin is unclear, but the power was terrible. Having subjugated the entire southern steppe, they moved to tear off fatter pieces - to Byzantium, Italy, Germany. The Bulgarians, subject to the Avars, remained in the Black Sea region. By the beginning of the 9th century, the forces of the Avars weakened in the fight against the Franks, and their huge empire - the Avar Khaganate - collapsed. On its eastern ruins, Khan Kubrat created an impressive state - Great Bulgaria. Its epicenter was in the Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov.

The troubled history of the Bulgarians could not give this people a long peace of mind. Kubrat's death created a vacuum of power in his state, which was cleverly used by the southeastern neighbors - the Khazars. This Turkic people has been prospering in the Caucasus for several centuries, combining impressive military power with subtle diplomacy, which reached its climax after the adoption of Judaism by the Khazar elite. Under the blows of its neighbors, Great Bulgaria collapsed - and the Khazar Khaganate extended its influence to the Seversky Donets.

KhAZARS

The arrival of new owners brought forgotten stability to the Donetsk steppes. The Khazar Khaganate showed itself as a force - and everyone who lived nearby was drawn to this force. It was at this time that large settled settlements again began to appear along the banks of the Seversky Donets. In most of them lived the remains of the Sarmatians-Alans. Along the right (southern) bank of the river, a strip of stone fortifications-fortresses arose. So Khazaria ensured the security of its borders.

Traces of this order were found at several points in the region: in the burial ground near Raygorodok (Alanian clay vessels), near the village of Mayaki in the Slavyansk region (Alanian settlement with tools and household items), in the Chistyakovsky burial (weapons and weapons of the Azov steppe). But the Khazar prosperity did not last long either. By the middle of the 10th century, after the campaigns of the Russian princes Igor and Svyatoslav, the Khazars were driven back to the Caucasus, and established themselves in the liberated territory ... No, not the winners at all. They just got not prey, but a problem. After the exodus of the Khazars from the Volga region, the next Turks rushed to the steppe expanses - Pechenegs.

PECHENEGI

The Pechenegs were at that level of formation of the early forms of the state, when the most energetic stood out from the mass of ordinary community members and became heads of clans and military leaders. The leaders of the tribes were chosen from among the nobility of the Pechenegs. Usually a tribe included several genera. Contemporaries of the Pechenegs, the Byzantine emperor Constantine Porphyrogenitus and the Persian geographer Gardizi wrote in their treatises that the Pecheneg union consisted of eight tribes and numbered about 40 genera. The Pechenegs were in constant motion and moved across the steppe with their herds. The basis of the herd were horses and sheep. The Pechenegs did not have long-term camps; light yurts served as dwellings. A yurt is a round dwelling made of felt and animal skins on a frame of wooden poles. An open hearth was always arranged in the center of the yurt.

Predatory wars were an important way to enrich the tribal elite. The Pechenegs constantly attacked their neighbors, captured people for the purpose of ransom, and took their cattle away. Neighboring states sought to make peace with them and pay off tribute. The Pechenegs captured all the Don and Kuban, advanced into the Black Sea region. In 892 they defeated the steppe Ugrians (Hungarians) here and reached the mouth of the Danube. The Pechenegs first appeared on the borders of the Russian principalities in 915. Prince Igor immediately concluded a peace treaty with them. Konstantin Porphyrogenitus wrote that the Russians strive to be at peace with the Pechenegs, since they cannot trade, fight, or live in peace if they are in a hostile relationship with this people. However, Byzantine diplomats soon bribed the Pechenegs and persuaded them to attack Russia. The Pechenegs staged terrible pogroms in the principalities bordering the steppe. Russia began to wage a long and exhausting struggle with them.

The Alano-Bulgarian population of the Khazar Khaganate suffered severely from the Pechenegs. Some settlements burned down in the fire and ceased to exist. The population of the Don region and Podontsovye suffered especially hard. There were no pogroms in the Azov region. Many Alans and Bulgarians (Russian chronicles call them Black Bolgars) entered the tribal union of the Pechenegs and began to roam with them. A significant part of the settled population remained in their places. Only in 1036 Yaroslav the Wise managed to defeat a large Pecheneg army near Kiev and put an end to their raids.

Soon, the Pechenegs began to be pressed from the east by their kindred nomadic tribes.

POLOVETS

The weakened horde was attacked from the east by the next nomadic Polovtsians (or Cumans) - and the Pechenegs scattered over adjacent territories. Torks tried to fill the void - and although they failed to gain a foothold on the banks of the Donets and Kalmius for a long time, they left an abundant mark on the geographical names of the region (Tor, Kazenny Torets, Krivoy Torets, Dry Torets, Kramatorsk).

The Polovtsian time has come. In the person of this people, Russia received an opponent even more dangerous than the Pechenegs. As they say, "the Khazars should not have been touched"... The Polovtsian confrontation with the Kive Rus lasted for a century and a half and was only stopped by the Mongol invasion. However, the relationship turned out to be peculiar. It was love and hate going hand in hand. In political interests, Russians and Cumans sometimes fought together. The ruling families of these peoples mixed blood in dynastic marriages if it seemed necessary and beneficial. However, as in an unstable family, the world immediately gave way to a quarrel. The Donetsk steppes lived like that - from surge to surge.

Polovtsian history left a specific mark in these parts. These are the famous stone “women”, which have already become a kind of “brand” of steppe life. Several copies stand in front of the regional museum of local lore in Donetsk and in the archaeological museum of the Lugansk National University named after. Taras Shevchenko. Stone statues from one to four meters high were erected at the burial sites and, contrary to their names, they mainly depict warriors. The very word "woman" among the Polovtsians meant "grandfather, ancestor" ...

MONGOLO-TATARS

After the conquest of the Polovtsian and Russian lands by the Mongol-Tatars, the age of the Golden Horde begins. The Donetsk steppes were of exceptional importance for the new owners - they connected two parts of their vast empire, the Turkic center and the Slavic east. Soon after the heat of war subsided, along the usual places (rivers and seas) the settled population begins to grow. The surviving Polovtsians also tried to find their place in this niche, maintaining a nomadic way of life, but in a more peaceful and not so active form. A chain of strongholds (“pits”, “caravanserais”) is being created along the steppe, facilitating movement through places that are difficult to travel. It seems that the khans understood that for their own well-being it is necessary to have a prosperous power in control. Trade revived, goods from Europe went to the Horde, which was relieved to see that the danger from the east had decreased. Items that came with overseas merchants were found in various parts of the Donbass: here - a Saxon bronze vessel-aquarius in the form of an equestrian knight with a girl, there - a candlestick in the form of a lion ...

The beginning of the period of the capture of Russia can be considered the spring of 1223, when the Horde detachments led by Genghis Khan came close to the Dnieper, where at that time the border of the state was located. The Russian princes at that time were in a state of enmity, so they could not give a fitting rebuff to the invaders. Despite the fact that the Cumans came to the rescue, the Tatar-Mongol army quickly seized the advantage.

The first direct clash between the troops took place on the Kalka River, on May 31, 1223, and was quickly lost. Even then it became clear that our army would not be able to defeat the Tatar-Mongols, but the onslaught of the enemy was held back for quite a long time. In the winter of 1237, a targeted invasion of the main troops of the Tatar-Mongols into the territory of Russia began. This time, the enemy army was commanded by the grandson of Genghis Khan - Batu. The army of nomads managed to move quickly enough inland, plundering the principalities in turn and killing everyone who tried to resist on their way. In Russia, the establishment of the Mongol-Tatar yoke with new laws and orders began.

The consequences of the Mongol-Tatar yoke in Russia were terrible: many cities and villages were destroyed, people were killed; agriculture, handicrafts and arts fell into decay; feudal fragmentation increased significantly; the population has been significantly reduced; Russia began to noticeably lag behind Europe in development.

At the beginning of the XIV century, the power of the Golden Horde weakened, and Grand Duke Dmitry Ivanovich, sensing this, refused to pay tribute to the Baskaks. Not wanting to endure such arbitrariness, Khan Mamai gathered an army and moved to Russia - to punish the recalcitrant.

Turning to all the Russian principalities with a call for help, Dmitry Ivanovich went to meet him. The two armies converged on the Kulikovo field - and Dmitry, cutting off even the very thought of defeat, ordered the bridges to be burned behind him. At dawn on September 8, 1380, the Russian monk Alexander Peresvet and the Mongol warrior Chelubey, according to tradition, met in a one-on-one battle. The battle did not bring victory to either of them - having mortally wounded each other with spears, both warriors fell. And then the Mongol army and the squad of Dmitry Donskoy, blessed by Sergius of Radonezh, began the battle. Although the Russian troops fought bravely, the Mongols greatly outnumbered them. It already began to seem that Mamai would win this battle - but Dmitry Donskoy relied not only on the courage of his soldiers, but also on cunning tactics. A regiment of more than ten thousand soldiers under the command of Dmitry Bobrok was left in an ambush. At the most difficult moment of the battle, the cavalry suddenly flew out of the forest. Deciding that the main forces of the Russians arrived in time for the battlefield, the Mongols took to flight. After this battle, Prince Dmitry Ivanovich received the nickname under which he went down in history - "Donskoy" (Kulikovskoye field is located near the Don River).

Despite the fact that the Tatar-Mongolian yoke lasted exactly one hundred years in Russia, the Battle of Kulikovo was of great importance for the people. After it, it became clear that the Golden Horde is not invincible, that it can be broken, and that Russia's gaining freedom is only a matter of time.

Complete liberation from the Mongol-Tatar yoke occurred only in 1480, when Grand Duke Ivan III refused to pay money to the horde and declared the independence of Russia. Standing on the Ugra River - military operations in 1480 between the Khan of the Great Horde Akhmat and the Grand Duke of Moscow Ivan III in alliance with the Crimean Khanate. According to most Soviet and Russian historians, it put an end to the Mongol-Tatar yoke in the north and northeast of Russia, where it lasted the longest and where the process of establishing a single Russian state, which became completely independent, was going on.

After 100 years, the great-grandson of Dmitry Donskoy Ivan III finally got rid of the Mongol-Tatar yoke. And the grandson of Ivan III, Ivan the Terrible, conquered 3 Tatar principalities: Kazan, Astrakhan, Siberia.

From the 14th century on the territory of our region there was a "Wild Field", in the concept of which many writers, local historians, teachers invest something historically unpromising, "lifeless", "robbery". Even the connecting threads - roads - are sometimes called "bandit paths" in the literature.

What did happen in Podontsovye in the post-Mongolian period? The main population of the steppe part of Podontsovye in the XIII - XIV centuries. the former Kipchak (Polovtsian) tribes remained. They continued the construction of mounds, but according to external signs, their burial grounds have undergone changes. For example, mounds were built only on the high ridges of the Donetsk Ridge, they were, as it were, lined up in a line with the direction "east-west"; earth embankments were absent, they were replaced by hills built only from stones.

Large movements of nomads from the eastern zones after the XIV century. hardly took place, but small ones were still quite real. The Polovtsian land, with its defeated population, could not but accept the Kipchak tribes of the Trans-Volga and Ural regions, close in ethnic origin, to the noticeably deserted territory. These could not be mass invasions, but, on the contrary, small groups of nomads who did not change the historical and ethnic situation of our steppes. From this one can understand why both medieval authors and archaeologists of our time, although they noted the migration of nomads from the east, did not attract substantive evidence of this process. We still have to find out the scale and consequences of such migrations, we are also prompted by linguistic data: after all, the everyday language of the population of our region carries a lot of Turkic words and concepts. Finally, we note that the archaeological materials from Provalye give reason not to exaggerate the idea of ​​the desolation of our region: the steppe continued to be inhabited even in post-Mongolian times. We think that the term "Wild Field" should be considered nothing more than a metaphorical concept, but not filled with historical content.

"Donetsk foot"

Donetsk steppe without edge,

Thyme and feather grass...

I love you dear

And in tulips, and in dust,

And in the snow of spicy acacias,

And in purple smoke

And in pyrite monists,

As a friend, I will hug.

I will cling to my native springs

miraculous keys,

So that the dark-faced miners

It sang sweetly at night.

I will take out a song from my heart,

I will put it on their hearts.

I will tell them: your work is honest!

I won't say any more.

1945 (Pavel Merciless)

For the first time, people appeared on the territory of our region approximately 150 thousand years ago in the Middle Paleolithic era. Ancient man - archanthrope(or Pithecanthropus) was distinguished by great physical strength and endurance. Archanthropes knew how to use fire, built primitive dwellings in the form of shelters from rain or barriers from the wind, and made stone tools. The main occupation was hunting for large animals. An important place was occupied by the gathering of edible plants. In mountainous conditions, archanthropes lived mainly in caves, in flat conditions - on the banks of rivers and lakes. Animals were hunted with the help of spears - large wooden pointed stakes, clubs and sometimes a peak with stone tips. For strength, the tip of the horn was burned at the stake. The archanthropes led a wandering life and stopped for several days where they managed to get an animal. Crushed bones of eaten animals, blunted stone tools and fragments of stone remained in the place of such camps. During excavations, hearths are found in caves.

Several camps of ancient people have been found in the Donbass. All of them are located in river valleys near the sources of stone from which tools were made. Findings on them are extremely rare. Such camps in the open air existed for a very short time. The rarity of ancient monuments is also explained by their poor preservation. Traces of the activities of the archanthropes were washed away by rain and river floods. You can find ancient stone tools only after special searches or by chance in the coastal cliffs of rivers and gullies, in the walls of clay quarries. Almost all finds of stone tools of archanthropes in the Donbass come from high clay outcrops or from erosion of ancient rocks. The remains of the camps of archanthropes have been preserved near the city of Amvrosievka on the banks of the Krynka River, not far from Artemovsk, in Makeevka, in Izyum, near Lugansk, near the village of Kirov, Artemovsky district. All these finds testify to a rare but uniform settlement of the region.

About 100 thousand years ago, the archanthropes were replaced paleoanthropes(ancient people, or Neanderthals). Scientists believe that the bulk of archanthropes and paleoanthropes came to Eastern Europe from the west. Paleoanthropes were more perfect ancestors of modern people. They knew how not only to keep the fire going, but also to make it. Their speech was still undeveloped. At the same time, the first ideological ideas appear among paleoanthropes, the custom of burying dead relatives. Paleoanthropes were well adapted to the harsh conditions of the ice age and successfully hunted bison, saiga, cave bears, mammoths, deer and other animals. Bones of deer, horses, wolves were found at the sites of the Azov region. Throwing spears with flint tips served as the main hunting weapons. Stone tools were made with great care. Scrapers, knives, points and other tools have a variety of shapes. Most of them were intended for butchering the carcasses of slaughtered animals. Paleoanthropes knew how to make primitive clothes from animal skins and some wooden devices (spear shafts, knife handles, baskets, beaters, etc.).

In the Donetsk region, several dozen sites of this time are known. In terms of size and amount of household waste, they are much larger than the camps of archanthropes. In 1962-1965. archaeologists carefully excavated two ancient sites near the village of Antonovka, Maryinsky district. Bison bones and many tools were found here, processed from two sides. In 1968-1970. Donetsk archaeologist D.S. Tsveibel investigated the site of this era in the village of Belokuzminovka, Konstantinovsky district. Cores, flint fragments, side-scrapers and tools with serrated edges have been found. Another monument is known near the village of Kurdyumovka near Artemovsk. In the ancient layer, at a depth of about 10 meters, bones of ancient bison and rhinoceros, flint side-scrapers and points were found.

Man of the modern physical type first formed in the Middle East about 40 thousand years ago. He is called Homo Sapiens - reasonable man (Latin). It is also called neoanthrope. This man had a developed speech, knew how to plan his work for a long time. Art and religious ideas appear. The appearance of modern man coincided with a new era - the late Paleolithic (35-10 thousand years ago).

In the Late Paleolithic, the clan organization of society was finally formed. The genus included several families leading a joint household. The clan settlement in the Late Paleolithic consisted of 7-8 families and consisted of 30-40 people. Marriages within the clan never took place. Only representatives of different genera could form a new family. The family owned hunting grounds, hunted animals, so each person depended on other residents of the village and could not live alone.

The most severe glaciation occurred in the Late Paleolithic. At the beginning of this glaciation, the climate in southern Ukraine resembled the climate of modern Yakutia. Man was forced to learn how to sew warm clothes and build dwellings. They were different in different territorial zones. People have learned to build round houses - semi-dugouts - from the bones of mammoths. The remains of such houses, in contrast to the light tent-like dwellings of buffalo hunters, have been well preserved to this day. They are known in Kiev, Chernihiv region, on the Middle Don.

People learned how to prick flint in a new way and make long and thin plates out of it. Flint wafers were used to make scrapers, chisels, knives, tip inserts, and other tools. Upon receipt of the plates, prismatic cores were formed. In the Slavyansk region, near the village of Sidorovo, an ancient workshop has been preserved, where people replenished stocks of flint raw materials, made blanks of cores and plates from it. A similar workshop was found near the village of Novoklinovka in the Amvrosievsky district on the banks of the Krynka River. It originated near the chalk outcrops.

In 1935, archaeologist and local historian V.M. Evseev in the Kazennaya gully near Amvrosievka discovered a very large accumulation of bones of ancient bison, and next to it, a Late Paleolithic site. On the slope of the beam in a small ravine, the bones of a thousand animals have been preserved. Fragments of arrowheads, flint inserts and knives were found along with the remains of bison.

In the more northern regions of Ukraine at that time, mammoth and reindeer dominated. Hunters specialized in the extraction of these animals. In our region, traces of mammoth hunters were found near the village of Prishib, Slavyansk region, in the north of the Luhansk region.

The last period of the Stone Age is called the Neolithic (VI-IV thousand years BC). In the Neolithic, the population increased so much that hunting game became scarce and it became necessary to additionally cultivate the land, grow grain, and engage in cattle breeding. In addition, the productivity of agriculture and animal husbandry is much higher than that of hunting and gathering. Such a transition to new forms of economy is called the Neolithic or agrarian (i.e. agricultural) revolution.

neolithic revolution- a natural phenomenon in the economic and social (public) development of ancient societies. Its essence lies in the forced sharp intensification of labor aimed at overcoming the food crisis. Societies based on a productive economy are undergoing a profound all-round restructuring: a settled way of life is taking shape, house-building is developing, new cults and myths about the structure of the world are being formed, and shifts are taking place in the social structure. Many Neolithic tribes completely switched to new ways of providing themselves with food, others (mainly in the forest zone) were still engaged in hunting and gathering. Agriculture and cattle breeding were developed primarily in warm areas, where there were conditions for growing crops and grazing, including in the south of Ukraine.

In the Neolithic, people learned to sculpt and fire pottery. The first pots had a sharp or round bottom, richly ornamented with various indentations and stamps, incised ornaments. Earthenware became widespread in connection with agriculture, as it was intended mainly for preparing various porridges from crushed grains of millet, barley and wheat.

The Neolithic population of Donbass practiced a mixed economy - hunting and gathering combined with primitive agriculture. Tribes with such an economy settled mainly in the valley of the Seversky Donets, because. a very favorable natural environment has developed here.

In the Neolithic, large tribes are formed, uniting several large clans. The tribes controlled the territory on which their hunting grounds, cultivated areas, lakes, thickets of edible plants were located. A foreign tribe had no right to use these lands without the consent of the owners. Clans and tribes were ruled by elders from the most respected people.

In Podontsovye lived mostly tribes Dnieper-Donets culture. They were concentrated in the Seversky Donets basin, in the interfluve of the Dnieper and Don (archaeological culture refers to a large group of people - several tribes who lived in a certain territory, spoke the same language, conducted the same household and built houses in the same way, made dishes, stone tools and etc.). At an early stage of the Dnieper-Donets culture, pottery was still unknown.

In addition to the monuments of the Dnieper-Donetsk culture, in Podontsovye there are sometimes settlements of a more northern pit-comb culture forest hunters. This name comes from the method of ornamentation of clay vessels.

A special branch of the economy of the Donetsk Mesolithic and Neolithic tribes was the manufacture of flint tools for their own needs and especially for exchange. The flint deposited in the chalk forms rich deposits along the right bank of the Donets, along the valleys of the Krynka, Bakhmutka, Kazenny and Sukhoi Tortsov rivers. The growth of the Neolithic population, the increase in the size of tools and the widespread use of flint axes due to deforestation forced ancient craftsmen to develop new deposits of flint and organize its extraction. The flint pieces collected on the chalk slopes or extracted from the bowels were pre-processed here on the spot or nearby. Chalk crust and irregularities were beaten off flint concretions, blanks of cores, axes, arrowheads and darts were made from the core. In the course of processing, stone chippers, numerous flakes and fragments of flint, failed and broken products were thrown out. Such places of preliminary processing of flint are called flint workshops. The largest clusters of workshops are known near the villages of Krasnoe in the Artemovsky district, Belaya Gora in the Konstantinovsky district, in the vicinity of Kramatorsk and in other places. Judging by the huge amount of splitting waste, the workshops functioned for many hundreds of years.

Usually the workshops were visited during the warm season. On canoes and wooden rafts, flint products were delivered to the areas of long-term settlements. Part of the products was transferred to neighbors in exchange for their wealth. So flint tools from the Donetsk Ridge came to the Azov, Dnieper and other regions.

At the end of the Neolithic, in the 4th millennium BC, a strong and large community lived in the area of ​​modern Mariupol. The settlement of this community has not been found, but a family burial ground has been discovered. The excavations were carried out under the guidance of the Kiev archaeologist N.E. Makarenko. The Mariupol burial ground was a long rectangular pit containing 122 skeletons arranged in four rows. The buried men and women were dressed in rich clothes, sheathed with bone beads, plates of boar tusks. The buried were accompanied by stone pendants, flint knives, necklaces made of animal fangs, axes, arrows, and a drilled stone mace. All burials were thickly covered with ocher. According to ancient beliefs, red ocher symbolized purification and rebirth after death. In ancient times, there was a long hut-like structure above the Mariupol burial ground. The burial ground was the ancestral tomb of the community, whose members continued to remain together even after death. Similar Late Neolithic burial grounds are known in the rapids of the Dnieper, where related tribes lived.

Eneolithic(Copper - Stone Age) begins in the middle of the 4th millennium BC. and ends in the middle of the III millennium BC. It was a time of complete transition to agriculture and cattle breeding. The productive forms of the economy have supplanted hunting and gathering and left them in place as ancillary means of obtaining food. In the southwestern regions of Ukraine and in Moldova, the famous Trypillia agricultural culture was formed in the Eneolithic. To the east of the Dnieper, in the steppe and southern forest-steppe, tribes lived in the Eneolithic, whose economy was based on cattle breeding, primarily horse breeding. In the few Eneolithic settlements between the Dnieper and the Don, animal bones are found, of which more than 50% belong to the horse. It is the oldest domesticated horse in Europe. Judging by the details found, horse bridles were already used for riding.

A few more copper items (axes, adzes, awls, jewelry) were highly valued. Copper came from the Balkans through the tribes of the Tripoli culture or from the North Caucasus. The main number of tools were still made of bone and flint. In the Eneolithic, the Donetsk center of flint processing reaches its peak. Old workshops continue to exist near the villages of Krasnoye and Belaya Gora, new ones appear near the village of V. Pustosh near Kramatorsk, near the villages of Malinovka and Rai-Aleksandrovka of the Slavyansk region.

At the end of the Eneolithic, for the first time, the custom appears to erect a large earthen mound over the burial. Such a mound is called a mound. As a rule, burial mounds were erected on high places and are always visible from afar. Barrows rarely contain one burial, more often there are several of them - sometimes up to 25-30. The first Eneolithic burial mounds were made in large pits and covered from above with a wooden flooring. The buried are densely sprinkled with ocher. So far, 20 such burials are known. In the subsequent periods of the Bronze Age (XXV-X centuries BC), thousands of burial mounds were poured in the Donetsk steppes. Now there are about 6 thousand of them. Their scientific research began more than 100 years ago. At the beginning of the XX century. the outstanding Russian archaeologist V.A. Gorodtsov conducted excavations in the Bakhmut district of the Yekaterinoslav province (part of the modern Artemovsky and Slavyansky regions). V. A. Gorodtsov noticed the difference in the types of burials and, on this basis, identified three archaeological cultures of the Bronze Age in southern Russia. According to the design of the burial structures, he called them ancient pit, catacomb and log cabins. This division of cultures retains its significance to this day. Ancient pit burials were made in ordinary pits, catacomb graves have a deep entrance well and a side chamber - a lining (it is called a catacomb), a low rectangular log cabin was built in log graves (often it was replaced by a stone box).

Pit culture Donbass was formed on the basis of local Eneolithic tribes. It dates from the XXV-XXI centuries. BC. Ancient pit settlements were found in the Don region, the Dnieper region and in the Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov (near the village of Razdolnoye in the Starobeshevsky district). The ancient Yamniks were mainly engaged in cattle breeding, bred horses, bulls, goats, sheep, and pigs. The bulk of the population migrated from one pasture to another. Shepherding was supplemented by agriculture. The proportion of agriculture was low. Anthropologically, the Pitmen were tall and well-built people. They were Indo-Europeans. The Indo-European community was formed in the Eneolithic and Bronze Age and includes the ancestors of many modern peoples of Eurasia.

Tribes belong to the Indo-Europeans catacomb culture. The tribes of this culture replaced the ancient Yamniks and existed in the vast expanses of the Left-bank Ukraine in the 20th-15th centuries. BC. In the Sea of ​​Azov, the ancient pit and catacomb tribes coexist for some time. The economy of the catacombs was in many respects the same as that of their predecessors. Life and way of life was the same shepherd. Rare settlements are known only in the forest-steppe. One of them was found in Slavyanogorsk. Only burial mounds have been preserved in the steppe. About 500 catacomb graves have been explored in the Donetsk region. There are especially many of them in the Slavic and Artemovsky regions. The burial structures and implements clearly show the social and property differentiation of society. Some warriors buried in the catacombs have special symbols of power in the form of drilled maces made of expensive imported stone. There are also burials of artisans, metallurgists, furriers, etc.

In the XV century. BC. the situation in the steppe and forest-steppe is changing dramatically. Numerous Iranian-speaking tribes of the so-called Srubnaya archaeological culture. They completely mastered the Donetsk lands. The economy of the Srubny society was based on an integrated agricultural and livestock economy. Agriculture was predominantly hoe. The main agricultural crop was barley. Animal husbandry of the Srubny tribes was mainly home-based. In the warm season, cattle graze freely around the villages, in winter they were kept in pens or in people's dwellings. Bred mainly bulls and sheep. Part of the food was provided by hunting and fishing. The agricultural and pastoral economy determined the settled way of life of the Srubny tribes. They lived in large settlements located on the banks of rivers and gullies. The dwellings looked like semi-dugouts and went deep into the ground by 1.0-1.2 meters. In Podontsovye, in the settlements near Usov Ozero, Limansky Ozero, the village of Ilyichevka, Krasnolimansky District, dwellings built using wood were found. In the southern regions of the region, stone was used as the main building material. The log craftsmen were excellent potters. Bone processing has made great strides. From horn and bone, arrowheads and harpoons, buckles, knitting needles, jewelry, various tools for processing animal skins were made. Bronze metallurgy was of particular importance in the life of the Srubny tribes. Donetsk srubniki not only used products from imported metal, but also learned how to smelt their own copper. Quarries for the extraction of copper ore were located near the villages of Vyskrivka, Pilipchatino, Klinovoye in the Artemovsky district. After adding tin to copper, a wonderful strong and fusible metal was obtained - bronze. In the long-term settlements of metallurgists in Podontsovye (Usovo Ozero, etc.), various products were cast from bronze: axes, adzes, chisels, knives and daggers, jewelry. These products were distributed not only in the Donts region, but also in the Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov and to the northern tribes.

cemetery

Mariupol burial ground- a burial ground that was discovered on the left bank of the Kalmius, on the outskirts of Mariupol during the construction of the Azovstal plant).

The burial ground dates back to the 3rd millennium BC (Eneolithic) and belongs to the Lower Don culture.

The burial ground was discovered by an employee of the Novotrubny Plant, G.F. Kravets.

From August 10 to October 15, 1930, Nikolai Emelyanovich Makarenko excavated here.

Burials of pastoralists were found in the burial ground, which can be seen from the decorations made of wild boar fangs, teeth and bones of animals, and shells. Also found were stone tools, stone mace-tops, ceramics, grave goods, beads, including those in the form of a crescent, which supposedly played the role of money, and burial shrouds.

Burials were in graves 28 meters long and about 2 meters wide. A total of 122 burials were found. The skeletons are located in an extended position, about half of them are covered with red ocher.

On ceramic dishes, scientists saw an ornamental pattern that was unchanged in all burials from the Dnieper to the Don. The people buried in the Mariupol burial ground had a developed religious system (there were amulets, figurines of fetish bulls, maces, close proximity to the river, along which, according to many beliefs, the souls of the dead went to another world). Among the finds are 2 carved figurines of a bull - examples of realistic art, mother-of-pearl beads, stripes for clothes made from boar tusks, a whorl (weaving tool). The remains belonged to people of a large Caucasian race, who were tall (172-174 cm), very long legs, and a massive skeleton. It is known from archaeological data that part of the population of the Lower Don culture around 5100 BC. e. under the pressure of the arid climate, she went to the Western Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov and settled next to the tribes of the Sura culture. As a result of their interaction, a new culture appeared - the Azov-Dnieper (5100 - 4350 BC).

In addition to the Mariupol burial ground, Neolithic sites in the Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov are: Razdorskoye, Samsonovo, Rakushechny Yar, 5 burials on the Karataevo farm (Rostov-on-Don).

(the burial ground was discovered in 1930 during the construction of the Azovstal plant) on the territory of the left bank of the Kalmius, a Late Neolithic tribal burial (5500-5200 BC) of the Lower Don culture was discovered. There were found 122 burials of people, ceramics, grave goods (shells of mollusks, plates and scrapers made of silicon, beads, including those in the form of a crescent, supposedly playing the role of money, burial shrouds, ocher - a symbol of blood and fire, which was showered on the corpses of the dead and other subjects). On ceramic dishes, scientists saw an ornamental pattern that was unchanged in all burials from the Dnieper to the Don. The people buried in the Mariupol burial ground had a developed religious system (there were amulets, figurines of fetish bulls, maces, close proximity to the river, along which, according to many beliefs, the souls of the dead went to another world). Among the finds are 2 carved figurines of a bull - examples of realistic art, mother-of-pearl beads, stripes for clothes made from boar tusks, a whorl (weaving tool). The remains belonged to people of a large Caucasian race, who were tall (172-174 cm), very long legs, and a massive skeleton. It is known from archaeological data that part of the population of the Lower Don culture around 5100 BC. e. under the pressure of the arid climate, she went to the Western Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov and settled next to the tribes of the Sura culture. As a result of their interaction, a new culture emerged - Azov-Dnieper(5100 - 4350 BC). In addition to the Mariupol burial ground, Neolithic sites in the Azov region are: Razdorskoye, Samsonovo, Rakushechny Yar, 5 burials on the Karataevo farm (Rostov-on-Don).

The early stage of the Eneolithic (Copper-Bronze Age, 5-4 thousand years ago) In the Northern Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov is associated with the formation srednestog(or Skelyanskaya, Novodanilovskaya) culture (3800-3300 BC), formed on the basis of the traditions of the Lower Don and Sura cultures in the Kalmius interfluve

and the Lower Don. The Sredny Stog culture includes 4 burials near the Mariupol burial ground (the walls of the graves were reinforced with stone slabs, maces with a kidney-shaped pommel, pendants made of marmot teeth, boar fangs, copper beads, bracelets, a belt of mother-of-pearl threads, the grave was covered with stones from above). Upon contact of the Skelyan and Azov-Dnieper cultures, the following Eneolithic culture was formed - Kvityanskaya(late IV-I half of the III millennium BC), which laid the foundation for the emergence of mounds ("graves") in the Northern Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov ("uterine" position of the deceased, head orientation to the east, plant litter, ocher as an element of burial, the presence of cromlech - stone ring outline).

The archaeological sites of the Azov region also belong to the Eneolithic.

Nizhnemikhailovsky culture(3000 - 2600 BC: burial mounds in the Ilyichevsk district of Mariupol, on the site of the power plant of the Ilyich plant) - was characterized by the creation of peculiar cult complexes - stelae and altars, graves with black-polished pots with parting food,

Zhivatilovo-Volchanskaya culture(mid-III millennium BC: burials near the village of Sartana) - in addition to pots, there were also some kind of playing chips in the form of bones of the kneecaps, astragalus and metapodievets,

pit culture(Late Eneolithic, mid-3rd millennium BC: multiple mounds in the area of ​​Volonterovka and Novoselovka, near the villages of Kremenevka, Ogorodnoye, Chermalyk, etc.) - the orientation of the deceased to the sunrise and moon, the presence of horizontal platforms on top of the mound for funeral rituals . It is this culture that owns about 80% of all mounds of the Northern Black Sea region. In the mounds stone graves”and in the city itself (the barrow at the intersection of Builders Avenue and the street of the Uritsky city of Mariupol, popularly called “Green Hill”, on old maps - “Grandfather”) traces of tribes of the copper-bronze era were found.

In 1993, during the construction of a water pipeline that ran along the outskirts of the Zelenaya Gorka mound (Mariupol), bones were found, three burials dating back to the Bronze Age were found, it is possible that there are burials of the Scythian-Sarmatian period in the mound. Individual mounds have a soil volume of more than 2000 m³, and a weight of more than 2400 tons. In those years, people lived quite tall (men - 173 cm, women - 160 cm), more like eastern peoples, at the same time the Indo-European (Aryan) language family was actively developing.

The find of the Mariupol archaeological expedition in 1984 was recognized as unique. Near Mariupol, the remains of wooden four-wheeled carts with solid wooden disc-shaped wheels were found. Scientists have dated this find to the 27th century BC. e. Thus, the wagons found in the Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov are today one of the oldest types of wheeled transport in the world (previously, the transport of Mesopotamia of the 26th century BC was considered such).

Bronze Age

The Copper Age (Eneolithic) was replaced by bronze age. The largest monuments of the cultures of the Bronze Age of the Sea of ​​Azov:

catacomb culture(XXVІІ-XX centuries BC): burial at the construction site of the second mannesman plant named after Ilyich, barrows "Grandfather", "Vineyards", burial ground "Zirka", a barrow near the village. Kamensk - found bronze knives, an awl, the remains of a wheeled transport, the burial of a young man who made arrows,

Babin culture(XX-XVI centuries BC): mound group "B" at the site of the Azovstal plant, Samoilovo, Stary Krym - burials look poorer than catacombs, the appearance of male belt buckles made of bone and horn, anthropologically - Indo-Iranian tribes with an admixture of ancient Mediterranean type

log culture(XVI-XII centuries BC): the barrow group "Baba" near the village of Nikolaevka, Volnovakhsky district, near the village of Kamensk, group "B" at the site of "Azovstal" - the deceased in the barrows was surrounded by a wooden structure made of logs - a log house, there was a sharp population growth,

Belozerskaya culture(XII-X centuries BC) - associated with some impoverishment of local plant reserves, which caused several waves of population migrations.

iron age

In the early Iron Age at the beginning of the first millennium BC, tribes lived in the northern Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov. Cimmerians(900-650 BC), engaged in nomadic cattle breeding and agriculture, using iron instead of stone in almost all sectors of the economy. At the same time, the first historical (actually written) sources about the Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov and its inhabitants appear. Judging by the ceramics, the continuity of the culture of the Cimmerians can be traced to the previous Bronze Belozyor culture. The Cimmerians, judging by the sources (Homer and other ancient Greek and Eastern authors), were the military elite of the multilingual pre-Scythian population of the Northern Black Sea and Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov. Their burials were found in several villages near Mariupol: Ogorodnoye, Razdolnoe, Sartana, Vasilievka and others.

The Azov steppes became the homeland for many ancient tribes (2.5-2 thousand years ago): in the 7th century BC, the Scythians came to the Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov from behind the Don (7th-6th centuries BC, ousted the Cimmerians), and five centuries later they were supplanted by the Sarmatians. Formation Scythians took place on the territory of modern Altai, Southern Siberia, Kazakhstan, later they moved to the Caucasus, and from the 2nd half of the 7th century - in the Azov steppes. An indispensable detail of the Scythian burials was lit - a double large case made of leather, wood or metal for storing bows and arrows. In the VI-V centuries BC. e. in the Northern Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov there was a trading colony (emporium) Kremny (Greek "rocky ledge"). Scythian burials: near the village of Sartana, the villages of Kremenevka, Ogorodnoye, the village of Peschanoe in Mariupol. Fasteners for a quiver, bronze arrowheads, iron swords - akinaki, coins were found. In the IV century BC. e. north of the village. Sartan, the Scythians built a mound up to 5 m high (“Two-Humped Grave”), in which a noble Scythian was buried, next to whose grave there were 2 pits with funeral gifts under the mound (a wooden chariot and wine in 19 amphorae - imported from the Mediterranean region). The body of the Scythian nobleman was “guarded” by a servant with arrows, and his cook was buried along with a bronze cauldron filled with food. The built mound was reinforced along the perimeter with a stone belt up to 3 m wide and up to 2 m high, as well as a moat and three stone belts. The Scythians were typical Caucasians, their average height is 167 cm (men) and 159 cm (women), were forced out in the first half of the 3rd century BC. e. Sarmatians who invaded from behind the Don.

Sarmatians formed in Asia, in the area of ​​the Aral Sea, having a powerful cavalry army (the strike force of the army - cataphracts - horsemen armed with a heavy long spear with an iron tip) easily occupied the territory of the Northern Black Sea region. Sarmatian burials of the first half of the 1st century AD. e. found in 4 mounds north of the village. Sartana, where there were 15 burials, including a rich burial of a priestess (women among the Sarmatians enjoyed great authority and even took part in battles) with funeral utensils: jugs made on a potter's wheel, whorl, bronze mirrors, incense burners, beads, a rich dress, embroidered shoes, headdress. Male burials were accompanied by weapons - swords, daggers. In addition, Sarmatian burials were found in the Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov near the village of Shevchenko (Volodarsky district of the Donetsk region), Samoilovo (Novoazovsky district of the Donetsk region), at the mouth of the Kamyshevata and Samarina beams.

A new wave of conquerors - the Gothic invasion (3rd century AD) interrupted the dominance of the Sarmatians in the Northern Black Sea region. Due to the cold goths(an ancient Germanic tribe, the Ostrogoths), gradually moving from the Baltic Sea to the Black Sea, dominated the Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov for more than 150 years, during which time they almost completely destroyed the Sarmatian culture, cut off the Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov from the Ancient World. The Goths were engaged in agriculture, raised cattle.

Nomadic tribes in the Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov

In the 4th century, hordes of Huns(the first of the Turkic-speaking peoples of the Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov). Their invasions slowed down the development of the economy and culture here for a long time. Dark-skinned, Mongoloid, short in stature, having mixed with the indigenous peoples of the North Caucasus and the North Caspian (Alans), the Huns, led by the leader Balamber, collided with the Goths (the leader of the Gothic tribe of the Heruls - Alakhir), forced them far to the west, partially mixed with the local population. In 371 - 378 the Huns occupied the territory from the Don and Meotida (Sea of ​​Azov) to the Dnieper and Dniester and the lower reaches of the Danube, in 378 - 445 the Hun tribal union was formed. Few archeological monuments of that time have been preserved in the Sea of ​​Azov (Hunnic bows in Tanais, burials with horses near the city of Melitopol, on the Korushan River in the Berdyansk region, near the village of Novoivanovka, and a sacrificial place in the Makartet tract in the Zaporozhye region).

The collapse of the Hunnic nomadic empire began after the death in 453 of the leader of the Huns, Attila. Two sons of Attila (Dintsik and Irnak) took the Huns to the lower reaches of the Danube (part of the horde with Irnak later went back through the Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov to the trans-Volga steppes, dissolving in local peoples such as the Chuvashs). For almost two centuries, different tribes (Akatsirs, Saragurs, Urogs, Onogurs, Avars) moved across the territory of the Northern Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov, broke up and formed tribal unions. The most significant of these associations was the union kuturgurs(VI - VII centuries). Kuturgurs (or Uturgurs, Kutrigurs) - Finno-Ugric tribes that appeared on the territory of Northern Kazakhstan, adopted the culture and language of geographically close Turks. The burials of the Kuturgurs were oriented with their heads to the west, the skulls after death were subject to trepanation (unlike the related Onogurs, or Utigurs, who lived south and east of the Don River). For a long time, both peoples were at enmity (the attack of the Onogur leader Sandil, etc.), without creating their own powerful associations, and in 559 the leader of the Kuturgurs, Ziber Khan, even made an unsuccessful attempt to conquer the Byzantine Empire.

In 558, the lands of the Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov, pushing back the Kuturgurs, invaded Avars(or Varhonites - descendants of the Ugrians and Alans of Central Asia), who had previously defeated the Onogurs, Zals and Savirs. The Avars, moving further to the Danube from 565, founded the Avar Khaganate (538 - 803). They invented a hard saddle, stirrups and broadsword (a kind of saber). Avar burial was found on the left bank of the Mokryye Yaly River (body orientation with head to the west, earrings with polyhedral pendants, iron buckles on the belt, stucco pots, etc.), as well as near the village of Kominternovo (Novoazovsky district of Donetsk region) - a relief image of a man wearing a helmet (?), an imposing stele. The decline of the power of the Avars can be considered the unsuccessful campaign of the Avars, Slavs and Persians against Constantinople in 626, after which the liberation movements among the Kuturgurs and Onogurs intensify (they united against the Avars in 633 into an alliance of tribes led by the leader Kubrat - Great Bulgaria, or Onoguria).

Later Khazars, Pechenegs, Torks, Polovtsy roamed here. It was the Khazars who destroyed Great Bulgaria already in 656, and the remnants of the Proto-Bulgarian horde migrated to the Danube in 675 (led by Khan Asparuh) and founded the First Bulgarian Kingdom there. The horde of Khan Batbai remained in the Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov and became part of the Khazar Khaganate. Later, in the 7th-8th centuries, part of the Bulgarians went to the Volga, creating the state of Volga Bulgaria there. Khazars at the end of the 7th century, the Khazar Khaganate was formed in the south of Eastern Europe, the main population of which in the Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov were still Proto-Bulgarians (Turkic-speaking peoples who roamed the steppes, paying tribute along with the early Slavic tribes to the Khazars). Settlements of Proto-Bulgarians of the Saltov-Mayak culture in the Sea of ​​Azov: in the area of ​​Zintseva, Buzinnaya, Vodyana, Bezymennaya beams, on the territory of the modern Seaside Park of Mariupol (amphora ceramics, red clay pottery, iron knives, buckles, jewelry). Weapons were also found in Khazar burials, and even a paramilitary fortification, resembling a castle, on the left bank at the mouth of the Kalmius, which was limited from the south by a rampart). A small seasonal camp from the time of the Khazar Khaganate was discovered near Lyapinskaya Balka. A Khazar burial was also found on the territory of the modern camp "3000" of the Ilyich Moscow Iron and Steel Works (burial of a Khazar woman with a pot and a set of jewelry, a mirror and coins) and near the village of Peschanoe (a warrior with an arrow, a horse and a grindstone).

In the first third of the 8th century, the Arabs attacked the Khazar Khaganate, the Hungarians invaded from the north (they coexisted since the Hunnic period, slowly moving from Southern Siberia to the Urals - the 8th century, and then in the steppe zone of the Don and Khopra - the beginning of the 9th century, and under the onslaught of the Pechenegs - in the interfluve of the Dnieper and Prut - the end of the 9th century), and part of the Khazar aristocracy itself converted to Judaism, causing almost 100 years of unrest and civil war in the pagan kaganate. The defeat of the state of the Khazars was completed by 2 successful campaigns of the Kiev prince Svyatoslav in 965 and 968.

According to the famous scientist-historian L. N. Gumilyov, "... until the 10th century, hegemony belonged to the Khazars, and the history of Ancient Russia was preceded by the history of Khazaria ...". Subsequently, Kievan Rus seized the initiative in relations with the Wild, or Great, Steppe. However, the termination of life in the Proto-Bulgarian (Khazar) settlements in the Azov region was not connected with the Slavs, but with the Pecheneg invasion. All subsequent peoples of the Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov, the pre-Slavs (Pechenegs, Torks, Polovtsy) belonged to the Turkic peoples, were Mongoloids. All of them buried their relatives in graves with the carcass of a saddled horse, often used more ancient barrows for burials.

In the Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov there are burial places of nomadic peoples:

Pechenegs(X - the middle of the XI century, appeared in the Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov around 889, having founded the Pecheneg Horde, lived in the Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov for about 150 years until the victory of the troops of Yaroslav the Wise over the Pechenegs in 1036) near the village of Sartana, near the villages of Orlovskoye, Ogorodnoye, Zaporozhets, Kuibyshevo. Many stone statues of that time were found - “stone women” (in translation - “ancestors”): sandy in the village of Yalta, Guselshchikovo, granite in the village. Mangush, Oktyabrskoye (including 5 of which are kept in the Mariupol Museum of Local Lore): steles processed only from the "front" side and depict men (less often women) without a headdress, on the face - a "T"-shaped nose and eyebrows and not always marked eyes

Torquay(1030 - 1060 years, appeared in the Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov from the Aral Sea under pressure from the Polovtsy, later the same Polovtsy were expelled to Byzantium, Iran, the Caucasus, Kievan Rus, where they eventually assimilated) horse, statues, kumgan (pot for ritual ablutions),

Polovtsy(the middle of the 11th - the end of the 14th century, the "Polovtsian steppe" stretched from Central Asia to the Danube, in the Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov for about 200 years) burials in the Mariupol region: Novoselovka, "Two-humped Grave", near the villages of Kamyshevatoe, Prosperous, Vasilyevka, Razdolnoye, Samoilovo.

The brightest monuments of art and beliefs of the Polovtsian people are stone figures of Polovtsian warriors and women (the so-called "stone women"), which have survived to this day. They carry elements of individuality, perhaps even that specific people (relatives, leaders) posed for their manufacture. Unlike the Pecheneg women, the statues had a headdress, hair, a set of jewelry, and clothes. In total, up to 600 stone figures are known in the Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov, in Mariupol itself at the beginning of the 19th century there were 16 stone women (on street corners, on hills), many of them were damaged and lost during the construction of buildings. The figures of stone women served the Polovtsy as places for holidays, rituals and sacrifices.

It is the campaign against the Polovtsians (1185) that the famous monument of medieval literature “The Tale of Igor's Campaign” is dedicated to. Events developed at the headquarters of one of the most powerful Polovtsian khans - Konchak (presumably the area of ​​the modern city of Slavyansk). As you know, this campaign was very unsuccessful for the Russians. However, as a result of the campaign, the son of Igor Svyatoslavovich returned home with his wife, a beautiful Polovtsian (daughter of Khan Konchak), and there were hundreds of such inter-dynastic marriages in the days of Kievan Rus and the Polovtsian Khanate. At the beginning of the 13th century, the Polovtsians began to settle on the ground, at this time the peak of the development of trade in the Polovtsian steppe fell, individual khans began to accept Christianity after the Russians. However, the troops of the Mongol leader Genghis Khan were approaching from the east, which in 1220-1223 passed through the entire Polovtsian steppe and entered the Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov. On May 31, 1223, a battle took place in the Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov on the Kalka River between the Mongol-Tatar hordes and the combined troops of Russian princes and Polovtsy, which ended with the complete defeat of the Russians. (Scientists are still arguing where the Kalka River flowed, and the place of the legendary battle on the Kalka River in 1223 has not been determined). There are several places similar in description on the rivers Karatysh, Kalmius and Kalchik (the last two flow through Mariupol). In the 40s of the XIII century, the Azov steppes were captured by the Mongol-Tatar conquerors. The territory of the Northern Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov was first part of the Golden Horde, and in the 15th century it became part of the Crimean Khanate. Much later, serfs fled to the Don, Dnieper, in the wild field, fleeing from feudal oppression. So wanderers began to appear in these places and the Don and Zaporozhye Cossacks arose.

Ancient settlements on the territory of Donbass

Boundless wavy steppe... Scorched by the sun and dried up by eastern winds, dry winds, fescue-feather grass and wormwood grasses, bare areas of devoid of moisture and cracked earth, rocky outcrops of limestones and sandstones, occasionally supplemented by thickets of shrubs, and even more rarely - by small ravine forests - such was in the recent past the landscape of the Donetsk region

The Donetsk coal basin was formed on the bays and estuaries of a sea that did not exist for a long time. This sea occupied the entire eastern half of European Russia and the western Asian one, being divided between them by a continuous massif of the Ural ridge and crashing to the west by a narrow, strongly elongated Donetsk Gulf into the mainland. As monuments of a long-vanished sea, relatively small reservoirs filled with sea water, the Caspian and Aral seas, have survived to our era.

In exposed places, a thick layer of limestone was formed from shells that lived at the bottom of the sea. The shores of the sea were covered with lush vegetation characteristic of the Carboniferous period: monstrous sigillaria, giant horsetails, tree ferns, slender lepidodendrons and calamites. The remains of these plants, very rich in fiber, lined the bottom of a shallow bay, interspersed with sand and silt, began to rot and, as a result of smoldering that lasted for millennia, turned into peat, coal and anthracite.

Since the exit from the waters of the Carboniferous Sea, the thickness of the Donetsk deposits has been again flooded by sea waves three times - during the Jurassic, Cretaceous and Tertiary periods. The onset of each sea destroyed high-rising places by erosion and filled depressions with its deposits, thus contributing to the gradual leveling of the surface.
In the end, only their wide bases in the form of ridges remained from the mountain ranges that cut the area. A number of these ridges crosses the entire basin from the northwest to the southeast, clearly indicating the former position of the eroded mountain ranges. The most significant of these ridges is the so-called main fracture, or the Donetsk ridge.

Joint activity during the entire geological periods of ridge-forming and leveling process brought the area of ​​the Donets Basin to its modern form, representing a relief type known as the “Erosion Plateau”.

Donetsk region is considered to be one of the latest developed and settled in Ukraine. However, in reality, man and civilization appeared on the territory of Donbass a very long time ago. This is confirmed by archaeological excavations carried out by employees of the Donetsk Regional Museum of Local Lore.

Even in the first millennium BC, the territory of the region was part of the Scythian state, and the so-called Golden Scythia - the central and main part of the ancient kingdom. In the first millennium of our era, the Polovtsian tribes roamed the Donetsk steppes. Moreover, both the Scythians and the Polovtsy left a memory of themselves - burials in the form of barrows. And on these man-made hills there are steles, the so-called women, respectively, Scythian and Polovtsian.

Initially, the name Scythians belonged to a tribe that lived east of the lower reaches of the Volga, and then penetrated its western bank and the North Caucasus. From here, the Scythians through modern Dagestan and the Derbent passage rushed to the territory of present-day Azerbaijan. Here they settled and, probably including significant groups of the local pastoral population, made trips to various parts of Asia Minor.

Herodotus about the ancient history of the Scythians:
“According to the stories of the Scythians, their people are the youngest of all. And it happened in this way. The first inhabitant of this... country was a man named Targitai. The parents of this Targitai... were Zeus and the daughter of the river Borysthenes. Targitai was of this kind, and he had three sons: Lipoksais, Arpoksais, and the youngest, Kolaksais. During their reign, golden objects fell from the sky to the Scythian land: a plow, a yoke, an ax and a bowl. The elder brother saw these things first. As soon as he went to pick them up, the gold blazed. Then he retreated and the second brother approached, and again the gold was engulfed in flames... But when the third, younger brother approached, the flame went out, and he took the gold to his house. Therefore, the older brothers agreed to give the kingdom to the younger. So, from Lipoksais ... there came a Scythian tribe called Avhats, from the middle brother - a tribe of Katiars and Traspians, and from the younger of the brothers - the king - a tribe of Paralats. All tribes together are called skolots, that is, royal. The Greeks call them Scythians.
This is how the Scythians tell about the origin of their people. They think that from the time of the first king of Targitai to the invasion of their land by Darius, only 1000 years have passed. The Scythian kings carefully guarded the sacred golden objects and revered them with reverence, bringing rich sacrifices every year. If someone falls asleep at the festival in the open air with this sacred gold, then, according to the Scythians, he will not live even a year ... Since they had a lot of land, Kolaksais divided it, according to the stories of the Scythians, into three kingdoms between his three sons. He made the kingdom where the gold was stored the largest. In the area lying even further north of the land of the Scythians, nothing can be seen and it is impossible to penetrate there because of flying feathers. And indeed, the earth and air there are full of feathers, and this interferes with vision ...
There is also a third story. It says so. The nomadic tribes of the Scythians lived in Asia. When the Massagetae forced them out of there... the Scythians crossed the Arak and arrived in the Cimmerian land (the country now inhabited by the Scythians, as they say, belonged to the Cimmerians since ancient times). With the approach of the Scythians, the Cimmerians began to hold advice on what to do in the face of a large enemy army. And here on council opinions were divided. Although both sides stubbornly stood their ground, the proposal of the kings won out. The people were in favor of retreat, considering it unnecessary to fight with so many enemies. The kings, on the contrary, considered it necessary to stubbornly defend their native land from invaders. So the people did not heed the advice of the kings, and the kings did not want to obey the people.
The people decided to leave their homeland and give their land to the invaders without a fight; the kings, on the contrary, preferred to lay down their bones in their native land rather than flee with the people. After all, the kings understood what great happiness they experienced in their native land and what troubles await the exiles deprived of their homeland. Having made such a decision, the Cimmerians divided into two equal parts and began to fight among themselves. The Cimmerian people buried all those who fell in the fratricidal war near the Tiras River. After that, the Cimmerians left their land, and the Scythians who came took possession of a deserted country.
It is also known that the Scythians, in pursuit of the Cimmerians, went astray and invaded the land of the Medes. After all, the Cimmerians constantly moved along the coast of Pontus, while the Scythians, during the persecution, kept to the left of the Caucasus until they invaded the land of the Medes. So, they turned inland. This last legend is transmitted equally by both Hellenes and barbarians.

The fact that it was on the path of the great movement of peoples from the far east to the west had the greatest influence on the initial colonization of the Donetsk Ridge. The nomadic peoples of the East, for many centuries, swept in a noisy stream through this region, not wanting or not being able to settle in it themselves, and not giving this opportunity to others. Two opposing elements fought here: the northern element, the Slavic, seeking to take possession of the region through peaceful colonization, and the eastern element, the Turkic-Mongolian, sweeping away all the plantings of settled life and culture in its path. The struggle of these two elements for almost a millennium constitutes the entire history of the initial colonization of the region.

The beginning of the Slavic colonization of the region dates back to the 8th and 9th centuries of the Christian era, when this region, along with the entire coast of the Black and Caspian Seas, was ruled by the people of Turkic origin - the Khazars. Neighbors from the north were also considered under the rule of the Khazars - the Slavs, who paid tribute to them and enjoyed their political patronage.

The Vyatichi, Radimichi, and especially the Chernihiv northerners, the most energetic colonizers among the Slavs, also took part in the colonization of the region, which is why the entire colonization was called "Severyanskaya". The name of the Seversky Donets River remains to this day a monument to this former, subsequently destroyed colonization.

A new historical wave brings here new nomads, also a Turkic tribe: in the 10th century, the Pechenegs, who destroy the Khazars and extend their power to the Northern Black Sea and Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov and Crimea; in the XI century, the Polovtsy, who destroy the Pechenegs and take their place.

On May 12, 1185, the battle between Prince Igor and the Polovtsy took place on the Wild Field (now Donetsk region), which gave rise to the golden word of East Slavic and world literature "The Tale of Igor's Campaign".

Leaving Novgorod-Seversky on April 23, 1185, the army of Prince Igor on May 10, near the present village of Kamenka, crosses the Seversky Donets and heads towards the present Slavyansk. In the first battle with the Polovtsy, under the leadership of Khan Konchak, the Russian cavalry took part. But soon Igor's army switched to a foot battle: the Polovtsians were good archers, and on a flat, clean place they were able to quickly deal with the enemy's cavalry. It was enough to shoot not at the riders, but at the horses, which, mad with pain, would soon crush the entire army. Then the Polovtsy skillfully pushed the Russians back to the salt lakes, where they staged a complete defeat for them.

As you know, Igor's son Vladimir subsequently married the daughter of the Polovtsian Khan Konchak, and his grandson from this marriage 38 years after the defeat of Igor from Konchak (one grandfather from another) led one of the Russian squads in the historical battle on Kalka (also on the territory of our current region) on May 31, 1223 against the Tatar-Mongols, where he laid down his head, defending the Russian land.

In the 13th century, innumerable hordes of new nomads, Tatars, flooded into Europe from Asia, destroyed or swallowed up the Polovtsians, passed like a thunderstorm throughout the Russian land, destroying Kiev, Volyn, Galich and other cities to the ground, reached Hungary and, having failed there, returned back and formed the Golden Horde, later of which only one part of it survived - the Crimean Khanate.