As winter calls an inevitable conclusion to the year and the bite of seasonal inclemency commences its harvest reducing the verdure of summer months to the starved networks of forbearance that typify colder climes, the thought of many turn to the prospect of the hearth and the quilt, expedients which, in being claimed from the whim of finer wit, stand as truths which may themselves dictate the theme of many schools of more fanciful conjecture.
In St. Petersburg situated at an extremely Northerly latitude upon the Baltic coast such a maxim stands among all others as fundamental to existence, the Russian winter being a circumstance of such intractable severity that, throughout history, it has proven capable of claiming many lives.
And yet, despite such phenomenal adversity, the omnipresent threat of hypothermia, frostbite and influenza, the novelty of cultural invention in Russia has proven capable of achieving grace, pronouncing the tenacity of human ingenuity in the many modes of art, clothing and architecture beneath which it’s spirit chooses to manifest.
Russia’s Hermitage Museum situated upon the banks of the Neva in St. Petersburg is an example of such resourcefulness, an archive annexed to a palace constructed during the halcyon days of English seafaring when trans-Baltic trade was granted opportunity to purpose wanderlust, offering those willing to brave the threat of open ocean the possibility of adventure, the chance to earn recognition as a pioneer or die honorably for one’s country.
Following the invasion of Siberia by Ivan the fourth during the late sixteenth century, a conqueror who, in earning the sobriquet “The Terrible” through association with the manner in which he chose to conduct such campaigns, a form of taxation involving the trade of furs and gold ornaments was, upon a previously extant fabric of mercantile exchange which had been practiced in Russia since the era of Genghis Khan, established between Ivan’s newly formed Russian colony and it’s vassals, a reliquary which, in being observed to possess historic value by Peter the Great, was ultimately transferred to the “Kuntskamera” or Cabinet of Curiosities in Petrograd during the early eighteenth century, a collection of articles which, in having been accumulated through trade, was incidentally composed of a number of artifacts removed from the many burial mounds which incongruously littered the vast wastes of the tundra.
Consisting of a number of objects cast in solid gold, the inventory of many Siberian tombs was, in this sense, coincidentally observed to have been looted during Peter’s reign, an occurrence which, in causing the celebrated city builder to pass a series of laws in efforts to criminalize grave robbery, combined with the comparative isolation of many burial sites, to preserve much of what is presently known about early Russian culture.
Inaugurated into a collection of objects excavated from the Crimean peninsula during the foundation of the “New Hermitage” in Petrograd throughout the nineteenth century, “Peter The Great’s Siberian Collection” constituted, when exhibited, a fascinating reliquary of gold objects crafted to represent a number of arctic animals including reindeer, tigers, vultures and griffins in a style not dissimilar to that espoused by the Celtic cultures of Europe during the first millennium, a selection of artifacts rendered yet more intriguing for describing a civilization about which almost nothing was known.
Branded “Scythian”, in homage to the native nomadic culture which, in having inhabited the Eurasian Steppes between Northern China and the Black Sea during the first millennium before Christ, was described as barbarian by the Greek historian Herodotus, the civilization which the Hermitage’s collection depicted was, observed to have been a breed of cavalier that, in depending upon horses for swift transit across the vast plains of Southern Siberia, had, at some time in its history, perfected the skills of both archery and ambush becoming a war like culture capable of threatening the might of both the Persian and the Achaemenid empires.
Earning renown for engaging in wars with near Eastern civilizations, a series of conflicts which, upon being recorded by classical scholars, blessed the culture with a phantasmal ability to appear from nowhere and vanish without trace after having committed acts of rampant destruction, the Scythian race remained, for many years, an interest of nebulous persuasion, a contingent which, in circumstancing the incident of savagery and violence, appeared to possess no definite cultural origin.
Stormed in 1917 during the Bolshevik revolution, both “the New Hermitage” and “the Imperial Archaeological Commission” were absorbed into the Communist state which occupied Russia throughout the twentieth century, a period during which they paradoxically received a large amount of financial support, being divided into four departments assigned to study various aspects of Russian and Oriental history, a process which, in applying a number of Marxist theories to cultural research, proposed to chart the evolution of mankind in more than an immediately acquisitive sense.
Coincidental with the dissipation of the extant Nomadic “Tuva” culture in Siberia, a tribal civilization which, in milking livestock through into the twentieth century, gave some indication as to how the Scythians might once have lived, the inauguration of the Hermitage into Russia’s Communist ideology and the process of state education that it sought to enforce resulted in a series of collaborations between the archive and London’s British Museum, a provision beneath which the “Scythians, Warriors of Ancient Siberia” exhibition was ultimately conceived.
Although of sufficient diversity to merit distinction as an assortment of regional tribes, the Scythian culture as described in the British Museum’s exhibition, was observed to have been united by both the common usage of an Iranian dialect to communicate and the development of an individualistic artistic style which, in including references to both the mythical “Ouroboros” or world-devouring worm of the Greek magical tradition and images of tigers and stags consuming each other whilst locked amidst the raptures of mortal dispute, resembles the persistent struggle of light and darkness depicted in the Yin Yang symbolism of Chinese Daoism, an observation through which such imagery may theoretically be construed to represent a bestially inspired precursor to the codes of patience and forbearance later espoused by far Eastern religion.
Producing an extensive selection of belt buckles and bridles decoratively employed to fasten loosely tailored riding tackle into place and a number of painted culinary vessels crafted from bone, wood and clay, the Scythians were, in this instance deduced by the British Museum, to have originated from the “Altai Sayan” mountains in the ninth century before Christ, an epoch during which the native flora and fauna which furnishes Siberia was observed to have differed substantially from it’s present scheme, representations of felines large enough to attack horses being a topic commonly depicted in Scythian art, an instance of gigantism that, although potentially attributable to the Siberian Tiger or the Kodiak Bear, would, in modern Russia, represent an uncommon occurrence.
In distinction to the collection on loan from the Hermitage the British Museum’s exhibition also displays a number of mummified artifacts and articles of cloth preserved by the incessant permafrost of the Siberian tundra among it’s catalog of displays, items which give some indication as to how the Scythian culture both maintained its horses and buried its dead, a convention through which it was observed that the nomads often interred members of their race alongside their steeds with an assortment of weapons that, in being of a predictably uniform specific, became known among archaeological circles as “the Scythian Triad”.
The “Arzhan- 1” tomb discovered in the early 1970’s to the North East of the Caucasus is no exception to this rule, a complex of seventy large chambers which, although pillaged at some unrecorded point in history, were observed to have been fashioned from a selection of roughly cleaved larch trunks which clearly contained the remains of men, horses and “Scythian Triads”
Thought to have been constructed in the eighth century before Christ, a date which would place it at the beginning of the the Scythian evolutionary calendar, the “Arzhan-1” tomb was later accompanied by the discovery of the “Arzhan-2” burial site within its vicinity during the early twenty-first century, an un-defiled grave that, in being composed of a number of stone chambers, represented the first complete example of how the Scythian culture may once have buried its dead, an instance in which the tomb’s inner sanctum was notably carpeted with felt and contained a male and female figure who, in being decoratively dressed, were surrounded by a selection of ornamental items finished with gold leaf, a bridal suite beneath which lay a number of smaller chambers containing the remains of other bodies, who appeared to have suffered to violence.
The discovery of the “Pazryk” burial mound in the “Altai-Sayan” mountains granted further insight into the character of the culture’s weaponry and clothing, Scythians being observed to have worn felt stockings protected by leather boots and insulative jackets made from either fur, leather or felt, an apparel occasionally completed with a long pointed felt hat or, in certain instances, an elaborately carved crest crafted in the shape of an eagle bearing a deer’s head in its beak, an instance in which soldiers were also conventionally armed with an ax, a dagger and a bow, an item which, in being reserved special distinction through association with the civilization’s legendary aptitude for archery, was traditionally accompanied by an ornately decorated quiver thronged with finely crafted arrows.
Scythian women were respectively known to have both shaved their heads and worn wigs constituted from wreaths of hair surmounted by conical felt caps, using vanity mirrors, combs and hair pins to plait and bind their locks into knitted woolen tubes, an instance in which the practice of dying and weaving cloth to deter the bite of harsh season was observed to have been a skill honed among their kind, examples of woven fabric, stitched fustian and carpet fiber being found among the remains at the “Pazryk” burial mound.
There was also evidence to suggest that Scythians of both sexes tattooed their bodies, illustrating their flesh with images of the menagerie of beasts that may be found in virtually every aspect of their art.
Being of a largely nomadic persuasion the Scythian diet was perceived to have consisted primarily of milk, butter and cheese, meat being boiled in bags to preserve it’s fat, a resource presumably employed to alter the flavor of other food stuffs.
In crafting both ceramic amphorae and chalices for domestic usage, Scythians were also noted to have drunk tea and brewed alcohol, liquor being strained and boiled to reduce its potency although the practice of burning hemp in braziers situated at the base of small wigwams designed to collect narcotic vapor, would suppose that the civilization fully appreciated the pleasurable effects of intoxication, holding parties and banquets not dissimilar to the feasts of Bacchanalia and the Epiphany which were recorded to have been conducted by Romans at approximately the same time.
Scythian pottery was, beyond it’s expedient culinary application, also used in association with the burial of the dead, the faces of a number of cadavers discovered at the “Oglakhty” burial mound in the “Minusink” region of Southern Siberia being observed to have been masked with a finely illustrated layer of plaster, a practice which, in resembling that espoused by both the “Quing” emperor of China and a multitude of Egyptian undertakers, seems to have represented a universally accepted convention throughout the ancient world.
In being a right to construe art from expedient, to blandish adversity with novelty, man’s creative spirit is all too frequently cursed to court the omnipresent threat of hardship and, in chiding itself for having done so, almost universally observed to lie forsaken and unrecorded before the realities of a darker stake.
Sponsored by British Petroleum and organized in conjunction with The State Hermitage Museum of St. Petersburg, The British Museum’s “Scythians Warriors of Ancient Siberia” exhibition provides both a fascinating insight into the heritage of central Russia and the measures necessary to survive it’s climate, an odyssey which, in observing the sustenance of cultural idiosyncrasy within it’s scheme, represents a touching account of the persistent struggle which the human soul is cursed to wage between the maintenance of decorum and it’s quota of despair.
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