Comparative Notes on Hurro-Urartian, Northern Caucasian

area seems to be connected to the Lower Volga culture, where horse sacrifice and the
horse cult are documented at a very early age (starting with the end of the V mil.
B.C.). 127 Traces of ancient wild horses and perhaps of early horse-keeping and horse-
breeding (and at least horse-hunting) are found in the Volga steppes, making them one
of the probable areas for the domestication of the animal in the second part of the IV
mil. B.C. 128 From the point of view of a monocentric idea of acculturation of plants and
animals, as developed by N. I. Vavilov and his followers, a unique area of
domestication seems probable, although it is not easy to establish with precision the
differences between the wild horse (perhaps Equus caballus Missii) and the domesticated
one. 129 The steppe region between Xvalynsk (in the Volga steppes) to the east,
Dereivka (on the Middle Dniepr in the North-Pontic region) and perhaps also the
Cucuteni-Tripolye culture to the west have been considered as a possible area of horse
domestication as well as a homeland of the Indo-Europeans, whose spread has as a
possibility been connected with the use of horses. 130 In Dereivka many horse bones
have been found (probably showing, as M. Levine has recently suggested, that this was
the favorite food of the population and a main object of hunting). The supposition of bit
microwear on the premolar teeth of a stallion from Dereivka 131 has become a
Paradebeispiel of a trace of early domestication. It is suggested that early horseback
riding originated in the same area, leading to enormous changes in the means of
transportation. 132 Still the evidence seems scanty. In Dereivka a change in the teeth was
found in one stallion, but comparable results are reported in only 10% of horse
127 Vasiljev and Siniuk 1985; Gamkrelidze and Ivanov 1984/1995, I, 476; Kuz’mina 1996, 82-83 with
references.
128 Bibikova 1967; 1969.
129 Cf. Bogoljubskij 1979; Bökönyi 1974; 1978; 1980; Matolczi 1973; Uerpmann 1995; Adams, Mallory, and
Miller 1997.
130 Anthony 1986; 1991, 209-213, fig.1-3; 1994; 1995. For details of the Dereivka findings, see Telegin
1986. For a critical appraisal, see Häusler 1994; Uerpmann 1990; 1995; Levine 1990; Mallory 1981.
131 Anthony and Brown 1991a; Anthony 1991, 204. But the direct non-calibrated radiocarbon dating of
the skull of this stallion gives 2950 ± 100 B.C. (Telegin 1995, 11), which does not correspond to the other
chronological hypotheses concerning Dereivka (Mallory 1997a; Adams, Mallory, and Miller 1997, 275-
276).
132 Sherratt 1983; Sherratt and Sherratt 1988; Anthony and Brown 1991b; Anthony 1994; 1995 (with
maps and tables).