Aleksandr Lvovich Mongait, (1915—1974) was a Soviet Russian archaeologist. His most important achievement was ''Археология Западной Европы'', a fundamental work on

prehistoric archaeology Prehistoric archaeology is a subfield of archaeology, which deals specifically with artefacts, civilisations and other materials from societies that existed before any form of writing system or historical record. Often the field focuses on ages ...

of Europe in 2 volumes which made the achievements of Western archaeology available to the Soviet general public. In the early 1960s

Boris Rybakov Boris Aleksandrovich Rybakov (; 3 June 1908, Moscow – 27 December 2001, Moscow) was a Soviet and Russian archeologist and historian. He was one of the main proponents of anti-Normanist vision of Russian history. He is the father of Indologis ...

, the informal leader of the Soviet archaeological school, organized a campaign against Mongait, blaming him for "non-patriotic views". Nevertheless, this campaign quickly failed due to reluctance of many archaeologists to participate. In his book ''Archaeology in the USSR'' published in 1959 Mongait made reference to Victor Petrov, who at that time had a reputation of a

Ukrainian nationalist Ukrainian nationalism (, ) is the promotion of the unity of Ukrainians as a people and the promotion of the identity of Ukraine as a nation state. The origins of modern Ukrainian nationalism emerge during the Cossack uprising against the Poli ...

kidnapped from

Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...

by Soviet secret services. Ironically, this reference helped emigrants understand that Petrov in fact was alive and cooperated with

KGB The Committee for State Security (, ), abbreviated as KGB (, ; ) was the main security agency of the Soviet Union from 1954 to 1991. It was the direct successor of preceding Soviet secret police agencies including the Cheka, Joint State Polit ...

, as any reference to defectors was impossible in Soviet publications before ''

perestroika ''Perestroika'' ( ; rus, перестройка, r=perestrojka, p=pʲɪrʲɪˈstrojkə, a=ru-perestroika.ogg, links=no) was a political reform movement within the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) during the late 1980s, widely associ ...

''.

References

Selected works

* Mongait, A.L., Archaeology in the USSR. Foreign Languages Publishing House, 1959; 2nd edition, translated and adapted by M. W. Thompson, Baltimore-Maryland, 1961.
Монгайт, Александр Львович. Археология Западной Европы. Каменный век. М. 1973
* Монгайт, Александр Львович. Археология Западной Европы. Бронзовый и железный век. М. 1974. * Монгайт, Александр Львович, Амальрик, Алексей Сергеевич. В поисках исчезнувших цивилизаций. М. 2005 (несколько изданий). {{DEFAULTSORT:Mongait, Aleksandr Soviet archaeologists 1915 births 1974 deaths Ukrainian prehistorians