The Steppes: Crucible of Eurasia - units.muohio.edu - Miami University

fox, and birds (Chang et al. 2003). The recent excavations at Tuzusai, a large settlement in the
Talgar region (ca. 8 to 10 hectares), reveals the existence of both common and elite households.
At the most recent 2012 excavations, an elite platform or plaza area has been identified along
with lower rooms and storage pits.
The goal of this essay will be to summarize our most recent results that now show the
Talgar fan as an agro-pastoral economy where an elite or aristocratic class of individuals, often
associated with the rich inventories found at the burial kurgans controlled the commoners who
practiced multi-resource pastoralism and agriculture. The prominent burial mounds which
dominate the landscape throughout Talgar and neighboring fans served as symbolic
representations of power and hierarchical control over vast territories. The geographic
investigation of other alluvial fans along the base of the Tian Shan will also show the means by
which elites controlled territory through a symbolic landscape of kurgan constructions.
Michael R. Drompp, Department of History, Rhodes College (drompp@rhodes.edu)
Political Dimensions of Religion in Early Medieval Inner Asian Empires
In this paper I will examine some of the ways in which religious beliefs and practices
have intersected with political beliefs and practices in early medieval Inner Asian empires. In
considering the examples of the Rouran and Türks (Chinese Tujue), who dominated much of
Inner Asia from the early fifth to the mid-eighth centuries CE, I will focus on surviving historical
accounts as well as preserved myths in order to search for the presence of mantic-religious
beliefs and practices that could fall within the broad categorization of “shamanism” (which,
admittedly, is a complex and even volatile term). I will then further explore the possible political
connections and ramifications of these particular historical accounts and legends. Finally, I will
consider the relationship of a posited “shamanic-political” complex to a broader “religiouspolitical”
complex; the purpose of this will be to consider evidence as to how shamanic beliefs
and practices may have related to the Rouran and Türk empires’ support of more highly
organized religious beliefs and practices such as Buddhism or the state cult sometimes called
“Tengrism.” Although the evidence at our disposal is relatively slim, my conclusion is that
shamanic beliefs and practices were particularly useful for the promotion or reinforcement of
political legitimacy in Inner Asia; Rouran and Türk rulers employed mythologies, some of them
quite likely borrowed, that indicated – through the evocation of a shamanic world view –
powerful supernatural support for their states. Such mythologies provided ideological support
for these steppe empires and thus helped strengthen their political power.
Lois Hale, Hale! Art, Portland, Oregon (hlutwige@gmail.com)
A Recreation of a Pazyryk Pouch
1. Introduction
In the Altai Mountain region of Siberia called Pazyryk, a group of barrows which
belonged to tribes of Iron Age Scythians were excavated between 1929 through 1949 by Sergei
Ivanovich Rudenko. The excavations of these barrows produced some of the most spectacular
Central Asian artifacts ever unearthed. Among these artifacts was a small pouch which held,
among other things, coriander seeds. Made with leather, felt, and leopard fur, decorated with
gilded copper “duckling” figures and sewn with deer sinew, the pouch is notable due to the
refinement of its construction and beauty of its decorative elements. It was found with other
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