|
Central Steppe
This is a short History of the central steppe, an area roughly equivalent to modern Kazakhstan. Because the history is complex it is mainly an outline and index to the more detailed articles given in the links. It is a companion to History of the western steppe and History of the eastern steppe and is parallel to the History of Kazakhstan and the History of central Asia. Geography "Central steppe" is an informal term for the middle part of the Eurasian steppe. It is grassland with some semi-desert and becomes dryer toward the south. On the east it is separated from Dzungaria and the eastern steppe by the low mountains along the current Chinese border. On the west it merges into the western steppe along the narrowing between the Ural Mountains and the Caspian Sea. On the north it is bounded by the forests of Siberia. The southern boundary has three sections. In the east the Tian Shan mountains of Kyrgyzstan extend about 650 kilometres west and give the steppe a sharp southern b ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Iranian Languages
The Iranian languages or Iranic languages are a branch of the Indo-Iranian languages in the Indo-European language family that are spoken natively by the Iranian peoples, predominantly in the Iranian Plateau. The Iranian languages are grouped in three stages: Old Iranian (until 400 BCE), Middle Iranian (400 BCE–900 CE) and New Iranian (since 900 CE). The two directly-attested Old Iranian languages are Old Persian (from the Achaemenid Empire) and Old Avestan (the language of the Avesta). Of the Middle Iranian languages, the better understood and recorded ones are Middle Persian (from the Sasanian Empire), Parthian (from the Parthian Empire), and Bactrian (from the Kushan and Hephthalite empires). , there were an estimated 150–200 million native speakers of the Iranian languages. '' Ethnologue'' estimates that there are 86 languages in the group, with the largest among them being Persian (Farsi, Dari, and Tajik dialects), Pashto, Kurdish, Luri, and Balochi. Terminol ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
South Siberian Forest Steppe
The South Siberian forest steppe ecoregion (WWF ID: PA0817) is a patchwork of grasslands and forests in the low-lying areas of south central Siberia. The region is one of high biodiversity as a transition zone between the West Siberian taiga to the north, and the Altai mountains to the south. There are also small patches to the east in Irkutsk Oblast. The ecoregion is in the temperate grasslands, savannas, and shrublands biome, and the Palearctic realm, with a Humid Continental climate. It covers . Location and description The ecoregion is a thin band of lowland terrain, long, stretching from Tomsk in the west, to the east of Krasnoyarsk in southern Siberia. On the western edge there is a north-south extension that follows the Tom River in the Kuznetsk Basin. In the middle is another extension, covering a low area along the Yenisei River and some of its tributaries; this area is known as the Minusinsk Hollow. To the west is the West Siberian broadleaf and mixed forests ecore ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Indo-Iranian Languages
The Indo-Iranian languages (also Indo-Iranic languages or Aryan languages) constitute the largest and southeasternmost extant branch of the Indo-European languages, Indo-European language family (with over 400 languages), predominantly spoken in the Subregion, geographical subregion of United Nations geoscheme for Asia#Southern_Asia, Southern Asia. They have more than 1.5 billion speakers, stretching from Europe (Romani language, Romani), Mesopotamia (Kurdish languages, Zaza–Gorani languages, Zaza–Gorani and Kurmanji#Dialect continuum, Kurmanji Dialect continuum) and the Caucasus (Ossetian language, Ossetian, Tat language (Caucasus), Tat and Talysh language, Talysh) eastward to Xinjiang (Sarikoli language, Sarikoli) and Assam (Assamese language, Assamese), and south to Sri Lanka (Sinhala language, Sinhala) and the Maldives (Maldivian language, Maldivian), with branches stretching as far out as Oceania and the Caribbean for Fiji Hindi and Caribbean Hindustani respectively. Fur ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Andronovo Culture
The Andronovo culture (russian: Андроновская культура, translit=Andronovskaya kul'tura) is a collection of similar local Late Bronze Age cultures that flourished 2000–1450 BC,Grigoriev, Stanislav, (2021)"Andronovo Problem: Studies of Cultural Genesis in the Eurasian Bronze Age" in Open Archaeology 2021 (7), p.3: "...By Andronovo cultures we may understand only Fyodorovka and Alakul cultures..."Parpola, Asko, (2020)"Royal 'Chariot' Burials of Sanauli near Delhi and Archaeological Correlates of Prehistoric Indo-Iranian Languages" in Studia Orientalia Electronica, Vol. 8, No. 1, Oct 23, 2020, p.188: "...the Alakul’ culture (c.2000–1700 BCE) in the west and the Fëdorovo culture (c.1850–1450 BCE) in the east..." in western Siberia and the central Eurasian Steppe. Some researchers have preferred to term it an archaeological complex or archaeological horizon. The slightly older Sintashta culture (2050–1900 BC), formerly included within the Androno ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Botai Culture
The Botai culture is an archaeological culture (c. 3700–3100 BC) of prehistoric northern Central Asia. It was named after the settlement of Botai in today's northern Kazakhstan. The Botai culture has two other large sites: Krasnyi Yar, and Vasilkovka. The Botai site is on the Iman-Burluk River, a tributary of the Ishim River. The site has at least 153 pithouses. The settlement was partly destroyed by river erosion which is still occurring, and by management of the wooded area. Archaeology The population of the Botai culture were connected to the earliest evidence for horse husbandry. The settlements of the Botai which consisted of pit-houses were relatively large and permanent. Enormous amounts of horse bones were found in and around the Botai settlements, suggesting that the Botai people kept horses or even domesticated them. Archaeological data suggests that the Botai were sedentary pastoralists and also domesticated dogs. Some researchers state that ho ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tokharian
The Tocharian (sometimes ''Tokharian'') languages ( or ), also known as ''Arśi-Kuči'', Agnean-Kuchean or Kuchean-Agnean, are an extinct branch of the Indo-European language family spoken by inhabitants of the Tarim Basin, the Tocharians. The languages are known from manuscripts dating from the 5th to the 8th century AD, which were found in oasis cities on the northern edge of the Tarim Basin (now part of Xinjiang in Northwest China) and the Lop Desert. The discovery of these languages in the early 20th century contradicted the formerly prevalent idea of an east–west division of the Indo-European language family as centum and satem languages, and prompted reinvigorated study of the Indo-European family. Scholars studying these manuscripts in the early 20th century identified their authors with the ''Tokharoi'', a name used in ancient sources for people of Bactria (Tokharistan). Although this identification is now believed to be mistaken, "Tocharian" remains the usual term for t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Afanasevo Culture
The Afanasievo culture, or Afanasevo culture (Afanasevan culture) (russian: Афанасьевская культура ''Afanas'yevskaya'' kul'tura), is the earliest known archaeological culture of south Siberia, occupying the Minusinsk Basin and the Altai Mountains during the eneolithic era, 3300 to 2500 BCE. It is named after a nearby mountain, Gora Afanasieva () in what is now Bogradsky District, Khakassia, Russia. David W. Anthony believes that the Afanasevan population was descended from people who migrated c. 3700–3300 BCE across the Eurasian Steppe from the pre- Yamnaya Repin culture of the Don-Volga region. Because of its geographical location and dating, Anthony and earlier scholars such as Leo Klejn, J. P. Mallory and Victor H. Mair have linked the Afanasevans to the Proto-Tocharian language. Dating Conventional archaeological understanding tended to date at around 2000–2500 BC. However radiocarbon gave dates as early as 3705 BC on wooden tools and 287 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Yamnaya Culture
The Yamnaya culture or the Yamna culture (russian: Ямная культура, ua, Ямна культура literal translation, lit. 'culture of pits'), also known as the Pit Grave culture or Ochre Grave culture, was a late Copper Age to early Bronze Age archaeological culture of the region between the Southern Bug, Dniester, and Ural (river), Ural rivers (the Pontic steppe), dating to 3300–2600 BCE. It was discovered by Vasily Gorodtsov following his archaelogical excavations near Siversky Donets in 1901—1903. Its name derives from its characteristic burial tradition: (romanized, romanization: ) is a Russian adjective that means 'related to pits ()', as these people used to bury their dead in tumuli (kurgans) containing simple pit chambers. The people of the Yamnaya culture were likely the result of a genetic admixture between the descendants of Eastern European Hunter-Gatherers (EHG)The Eastern European hunter-gatherers were themselves mostly descended from ancie ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tarim Mummies
The Tarim mummies are a series of mummies discovered in the Tarim Basin in present-day Xinjiang, China, which date from 1800 BC to the first centuries BC, with a new group of individuals recently dated to between c. 2100 and 1700 BC.School of Life Sciences, Jilin University, China, (2021)"The genomic origins of the Bronze Age Tarim Basin mummies" in ENA, European Nucleotide Archive. The mummies, particularly the early ones, are frequently associated with the presence of the Indo-European Tocharian languages in the Tarim Basin,Baumer (2000), p. 28. although the evidence is not totally conclusive and many centuries separate these mummies from the first attestation of the Tocharian languages in writing. Victor H. Mair's team concluded that the mummies are Caucasoid, likely speakers of Indo-European languages such as the Tocharians. A study published in 2021 suggests that the earliest Tarim Basin cultures appear to have had high levels of Ancient North Eurasian ancestry, with smaller ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Horse Archer
A horse archer is a cavalryman armed with a bow and able to shoot while riding from horseback. Archery has occasionally been used from the backs of other riding animals. In large open areas, it was a highly successful technique for hunting, for protecting the herds, and for war. It was a defining characteristic of the Eurasian nomads during antiquity and the medieval period, as well as the Iranian peoples, (Alans, Scythians, Sarmatians, Parthians, Sassanid Persians) and Indians in antiquity, and by the Hungarians, Mongols, Chinese, and the Turkic peoples during the Middle Ages. By the expansion of these peoples, the practice also spread to Eastern Europe (via the Sarmatians and the Huns), Mesopotamia, and East Asia. In East Asia, horse archery came to be particularly honored in the samurai tradition of Japan, where horse archery is called Yabusame. The term mounted archer occurs in medieval English sources to describe a soldier who rode to battle but who dismounted to shoot. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
