Iranians and Greeks in South Russia - Robert Bedrosian's Armenian ...

THE PREHISTORIC CIVILIZATIONS 19
other seaports had the same history, Phanagoria and, in particular,
Hermonassa, which are situated on the other side of the straits, at the
mouth of the Kuban. With regard to Hermonassa, Hecataeus informs
us that there was another place of the same name, near Trebizond, the
chief port of the Transcaucasian mining district. Perhaps Trebizond,
a very ancient Greek colony, took part in the foundation of the Caucasian
Hermonassa, at the period when the Greeks were planting colonies
in the principal centres of civiUzed life on the Black Sea. I have no
doubt that the Carians, and after them the lonians, inherited their
commercial relations from their prehistoric predecessors. We need
not be surprised, therefore, that the oldest cemeteries in the Kuban
valley, which belong to the copper age, are exceptionally rich, espe-
cially in weapons, implements, and artistic objects, of copper, silver,
and gold, which can only be compared with the objects of the same
copper period from the ruins and cemeteries of Elam, Mesopotamia,
and Egypt.
The most interesting of these Kuban graves is that discovered by
Veselovski in the town of Maikop, under a monumental kurgan
i0'65 metres high (fig. i). At the level of the soil a circular enclosure
had been made of undressed stone, and in the centre a great sepulchral
trench dug, 142 metres deep. The walls of the trench were lined
with wood, and the floor was of pebbles. At the corners, wooden
posts supported the wooden roof of the tomb. A thin layer of earth
was placed on this roof, and above it another much broader roof.
Inside, the grave was divided into three by partitions, one partition
dividing the grave into two halves, the other dividing one of the halves
into two others. The chief part of the tomb, the southern, was
reserved for the corpgg , which lay in a contracted position with the
hands raised to the head. The whole skeleton was covered with red
paint. The funeral furniture of the principal grave was extremely
sumptuous : the skeleton was strewn all over with gold ornaments,
originally, no doubt, sewn on to the clothing ;
figures of lions, in two
sizes (pi. IV, 5 and 7) ; figures of oxen (pi. IV, 6) ; rings ; rosettes ;
gold, turquoise, and carnelian beads. Under the skull were found two
narrow strips of gold, pierced with eyelets, probably for sewing ornaments
on to them (pi. IV, i) ; earrings ; and other gold jewels.
Beside the skeleton were six gold and silver rods, four of which passed
through figures of oxen, of solid gold and silver, attached near their
lower ends (pi. IV, 2-4). The upper ends of the rods were pierced
for laces or ribbons. Alongside the rods were seventeen vases of gold,
silver, and stone, two of them with engraved designs (pi. Ill, 1-4) : of
these I shall speak later. The tomb also contained several weapons and