Отправлено: 06.12.06 14:04. Заголовок: Белорусско-литовско-латышское порубежье в эпоху железа и раннего средневековья

Шадыро В.И. Белорусско-литовско-латышское порубежье в эпоху железа и раннего средневековья

«BELARUSSIAN-LITHUANIAN-LETTISH FRONTIER REGION AT THE IRONAGE AND THE EARLY MIDDLE AGES
(ethnocultural aspects)

Vadim Shadyro
Summary

The author analyses early iron age ceramical material from the frontier regions of Belarus and reaches the conclusion that the character of the population was mixed up (striated pottery and Dnieper-Dvina cultures). By the end of the Ist. century A.D. the striated pottery tribes were characterized by activization and at different times they settled down in new places in the East direction (hillforts Ratunky, Zazony, Tarilovo). These facts are demonstrated by the diagrams illustrating the arrangement of different pottery types in the stratums (Fig. 1-3).

Since V C.A.D. the striated pottery began to disappear and was succeeded by semi-slipped and smooth-walled pottery, mainly in the form of a jar and a pail. Farthenware was usually ornamented by holes at the vessel neck. The new population used both old and formed new settlements (Tarilovo, Zazony, Prudniky) (Fig. 4-6).

The semi-slipped pottery is spread over for Belarus 40-50 km down from the actual borders of Lithuania and Latvia. Vestiges of Banzer culture are found to the east of the line: lake Osveya-Disna, lake Narotch - river Narotchanka (Fig. 9).

New traditions in the life of the people living on the borders of Lithuania are connected with the newly appeared cremation rite in the area of easterun Lithuanian burials.

The author explains all the social and ethnocultural changes by the process of the Great Migration in Europe since IV cent. A.D. the Vened group of tribes (western Slaves, Baltic people and perhaps, Germans) began to move away from the Baltic coast and the Vistula basin to settle down in the middle stream basin of the river Neman and in Sebej lake region through the river Western Dvina (Fig. 9). The author believes that migration stream contributed to the formation of Kryvitch people - Western Slaves who underwent strong influence of Baltic populations in the Middle Neman region and in /203/ their turn left their traces in the culture of local inhabitants. These peculiarities are reflected in the culture of eastern Lithuanian burial mounds. Moving further to North-East to Finno-Ugric territories through the Western Dvina they underwent strong Baltic influeuce. In Finno-Ugric surroundings Kryvitch tribes synthesized the culture of early long burials preserving in a greater part Baltic features. In its later evolution this culture in the upper reaches of the Dniepr and in the Belorussian basin of the Dvina kept the same Baltic character in the type of burial implements and of woman bijoux. Hence the roots of these traditions should be found in Latgallian and East-Lithuanian antiquities of the 3rd quarter of the I C. A.D.»