Północny Ałtaj we wczesnej epoce żelaza

The aim of the paper is to broaden the knowledge base concerning the cultural processes which took part in the Northern Altai region in the Early Iron Age by empirical research and theoretical studies (completing a doctoral dissertation). In order to fulfil this aim, it was necessary to finish work on the catalogue of all of the Pazyryk (Scythian) period sites in the Northern Altai region. The results of the excavation work on the archaeological sites of Chultukov Log-1 and Chultukov Log-9, and a a series of laboratory analyses, are taken into account in the paper as well. The mentioned sites are extremely important for the prehistory of the region. The cemetery, which currently comprises 123 kurgans, is one of the largest necropolises in the Altai, and its unique value lies in the fact that the tombs have not been looted. The settlement, which dates to the Hunnic period, provides new information about the transformations that took place in the Northern Altai at that time (3rd/2nd century BC). The thick cultural layer, the defensive character of the settlement, and the discovered farming tools are all indicative of changes in the mode of subsistence compared with the Scythian period. The results obtained hitherto in studies on the so-called Maima culture of the Hunnic period (among other places, at the Chultukov Log-9 site) seem to suggest an uninterrupted occupation of the North Altai between the Pazyryk (Scythian) and Hunnic periods. Another goal of the paper is to shed new light on the problem of the relationships between the Pazyryk population and the representatives of so-called Kara-Koby culture (the archaeological unit distinguished by the occurrence of burials in stone cists). Burials in stone cists were an ‘Early Scythian’ custom that retained a certain popularity in the Pazyryk period as a kind of anachronism still observed by a part of society. Another important issue is the role of the Northern Altai as a zone of intensive inter-cultural contact maintained via the valleys of the Northern Altai rivers. Gathering the source basis in the form of a catalogue of the sites from the region in question allowed me to analyse the artefacts of the northern origin (forest-steppe zone, the Bolshaya Rechka culture) and of the southern origin (influences from the classic Pazyryk culture from the high-mountain zone of the Altai)