Slide 30) Trypillian culture.

The earliest agricultural tribes at the territory of Ukraine were Trypillian ones. This culture integrated in the Right-Bank Ukraine and developed in the 4th-3rd millennium B.C. (1500-2000 years B.C.). Famous Ukrainian archaeologist Vikentii Hvoika (1850-1914), Czech by origin, was the first scientist, who investigated this culture. He started archaeological excavations not far from the village Trypillia (Kyiv region, 50 km to the South from Kyiv) in 1893. Sometimes scientists name this archaeological culture “culture of painted ceramics”. Archaeologists found more than 1000 settlements of this culture in Ukrainian territory. Minimal number of population of Trypillian culture was 1 million people. Archeological treasures recovered from their settlements include statuettes of both men and women, weapons and other items made of copper and other metals, intricately patterned earthenware and clay building materials. (slide 31) The female statuettes have featureless faces, while the males have oval, elongated faces with prominent noses and deep-set eyes. Some of the statuettes are naked while others are clothed, with the styles of clothing changing over the years, and the females wore their hair in different styles. The illustrations on decorative items and other artifacts retrieved confirm that the people living in these settlements farmed the land using ploughs, produced handicrafts and had a form of religious belief regarding mankind's origins and the afterlife.

Trypillians cultivated land with the help of stone and bone hoes (мотыг). Later they started to use primitive plough (рало). Trypillian tribes cultivated wheat, barley (ячмень), millet (просо), beans, and flax (лен). In gardening they have grown apricots, plums and cherry-plums (aлычу) (by the way they are still popular here). Each 50-100 years people should change place of living because the land became exhausted. Stock-raising was also developed (cows, pigs, horses). Trypillian people knew the wheel. Hunting and fishing were also important for this culture. Trypillians were skillful in handicrafts. They made nice clothes not only from fur (skin of animals), but also from linen (полотно).

Ceramic production got high level of development. Trypillian people made ceramics by hands (they did not know the potter’s wheel). Beautiful ornaments, original small plastic, wonderful ceramic forms are the evidence of high level of spirituality of Trypillians. (Slides of ceramics)

The world began to use bronze in the end of the III millennium BC. Trypillya bronze date from the V millennium – Trypillian people at that time already had a large number of high quality copper instruments with no defects or cracks. Most nations believe it was them who invented the wheel. However, the fact is that while the whole world believes that the most ancient wheel image is located on the southern Sumerian murals (стенопис) of Mesopotamia (3,200 BC), the Tripillya ceramic figures have the picture of a wheel in 5,000 years BC (if true dating). A horse image is much more common in Trypillian materials than in other cultures of that time. Just as statues of other domestic animals – cows, bulls, pigs, cats and dogs.

Trypillian people lived in big settlements which are usually named proto-cities (first cities). Territory of some settlements occupied hundred hectares, and the population was 10-15 thousand people. It points on high level of social organization of Trypillian tribes. Typical Trypillian settlement consisted of houses, placed on a circle with a special square in the middle. (slide 32) Houses were 1 or 2-storied. They were divided into some living rooms and depositories. Each room had a stove and big ceramic pots used like grain tanks. The clay was the main material for building.

(slide 33) A Temple was situated in a central square of proto-cities and played a significant role in lives of Trypillian people. It was brightly painted, ornamented, had high arches, a cross-shaped altar and a kapala (a sacrificial bowl). (slide 34) It is suggested that the main idea of Trypillia temples was that of Resurrection, achieved through certain rituals in order to get to the ultimate goal – immortality of human soul. Home altars always had clay statuettes of Higher Powers, they worshipped: Mother Goddess – the symbol of motherhood and fertility, a bull – a symbol of wealth and cultivation, a snake – a symbol of cunning, a dove – a symbol of the sky. Sacred Trypillian views are embodied both in clays tatuettes and in ornamental patterns on ceramics – images of the sun, spirals, crosss, circles, waves, (slide 35) an “all-seeing eye of Providence” (compare with Christian “Eye of Omniscience”) are widespread.

Trypillians worshipped to their own gods, carried on (slide 36) astronomic observations, had their own calendar, original imagination about the Universe. They had relations with Eastern Mediterranean and Danube regions (by the way, they received copper from Danube region). Social-economic level of Trypillians was similar to the Mesopotamians. But in full understanding it was not a developed civilization because Trypillians had no State, developed cities, and written language. Nomadic tribes caused the transformation of this culture and in 3rd millennium B.C. it disappeared.

Modern science has not found ethno-genetic connection of Trypillian tribes with newcoming ones. Trypillian culture had no direct genetic continuation here. So, we could not say that Trypillians were Ukrainian ancestors. Ukrainian people was formed and integrated later, in the Middle Ages.

But culture has its own laws of development. Culture likes heredity. We could find some elements of their culture in our life: household system, decoration of houses, and specific ceramic decoration.

(slide 37) Cimmerian-Scythian-Sarmatian cultural symbiosis. Among autochthonous (aboriginal) sources of Ukrainian culture we could mention Trypillian culture of 4-3 millennia B.C. and Cimmerian-Scythian-Sarmatian cultural symbiosis of 2-1 millennia B.C.

Cimmerians were the most ancient people at Ukrainian territory. They lived between rivers Tir (the Dnister) and Tanais (the Don) and also the Crimean and Taman peninsulas. Historical sources relate to the 9th – the first half of the 7th century B.C. Cimmerians had nomadic stock-raising, high culture of bronze and ceramics with colourful inlays. Cimmerians started to smelt iron. Succeeding development was interrupted by Scythian invasion of nomadic tribes from Iranian territory. The oldest mention about them can be found in Assyrian cuneiforms (клинопис) related to the 7th century B.C. So, Scythian culture existed from the 7th century B.C. up to the 3 cuntury A.D. It is a culture of many nomadic, semi-nomadic and agricultural tribes. The Scythians-farmers get rich yields of wheat, which competed with Egypt wheat in the Greek market. Scythian horses were valued highly. Greeks imported wine, ceramics, and jewelry into Scythia. Traffic went through the Greek colonies: Olvia (near modern Nikolaev), Chersonese (Sevastopol), Panticapaeum (Kerch) and others. In the 5th century B.C. “father of history”, Herodotus visited Scythia and described its population.

Figure Gold vase with Scythian stringing his bow, probably Scythes, son of Hercules, who is successful and becomes King of Scythia on the territory of Ukraine. // httpwww.infoukes.comhistory.docm

The short bow was invented by the Ukrainian Scythians. It was designed especially for use on a horse. A Scythian could gallop on his horse and shoot back a dozen arrows a minute at a pursuing enemy which is a feat impossible with an ordinary bow. The Scythian bow was short with the ends curled forward. It has come down to the present day as the bow of Cupid who uses it to shoot his arrows of love.

Figure Cupid uses the Scythian bow from Ukraine to shoot his arrows of love (New York Times). // httpwww.infoukes.comhistory.docm

The Scythians piled up burial mounds of considerable size, sometimes putting stone sculptures of male warriors on the top. A burial mound, a barrow, also a grave is a burial monument, an artificial hill, a mound of an ancient burial. During several decades the so-called Bilske settlement in Poltava is being excavated, which, as scinentists believe, is the remains of the legendary city Gelons – the capital of Scythia. Arts and Crafts artifacts retrieved include ornaments, ceremonial weapons, harness (сбруя), and dishware. (slide 38) Scythian Pectoral of the 4th-century B.C. was discovered in the mound (kurgan) "Tovsta Mohyla", Dnepropetrovsk region in 1971 and became world-famous.

See Figure Scythian Pectoral

//http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/dd/Scithians_Pectoral.jpg

Scythian culture had some characteristic features: ceramics with geometrical ornaments; in painting there was a (slide 39) specific animalistic style. Decorative animal images or parts of their bodies (like a claw, a beak, a head) played the leading role in ornaments, small plastic, household decoration items. There were certain patterns, such as fish depicted only on headbands of horse bridles (налобники лошадей). This proves that images played both aesthetic and magical roles. Among the main animals that Scythian artists presented there were: a deer, a sheep, a horse, a wild cat, a fantastic gryphon, a rock he-goat.

(slide 40) Scythian religion was polytheistic. Tabiti – a goddess of the hearth (home fire) – was the main. The pantheon of gods also included Popeye – the lord of the sky, his wife Api – the goddess of the earth, the progenitor of this people; Goytosir – the god of the sun; Fagimasad - the god of the water and patron of horse-breeding; Agrimpasa - the fertility goddess; Targitai – the god-father of the Scythians. All of them are depicted as a man.

Golden plaque from mound Chertomlyk, IV centuryB.C. http://blogs.privet.ru/community/svetlana/84714746

Ukrainians inherited from Scythians a lot: a white blouse, boots, an acute-top Cossack hat, some details of armour (sagaidak, pirnach), some words “sobaka” (a dog), “topor” (an axe), “chara” (a goblet), “zvaty” (to call), “boyatysya” (to be afraid of), “horonyty” (to tumulate), “slovo” (a word), “zlo” (evil), “vyna” (guilty), “mogyla” (a grave). The Scythians of Ukraine some 2,500 years ago used the bones of eagles and vultures to make excellent flutes.

Mound Kul-Oba, Crimea, a rich burial of a Scythian king, belonging to the 4th century BC, was discovered and studied by archaeologists in 1830. It is the most famous mound Northern Black Sea related to the Scythian period. Unique gold jewellery and household objects found in the grave, are known to all historians of the planet. They are the true pride of the city of St.Petersburg, and are stored in the special Gold Room of Hermitage, located in the building of the Winter Palace.// http://lenino.crimea.ua/history-Article-10-1.shtml

In the 6th century B.C. steppe Crimea became the centre of Scythian State. Modern Simferopol is situated on the site of Scythian Naples, the Scythian capital. The city was ruined in the 2nd century A.D., when fights with the Sarmatians and later Goths became frequent. Sarmatic tribes occupied and assimilated Scythian ones. Sarmatian people accepted some Scythian traditions. Both these Asiatic nomads came from Iranian territory. They became the ethnic material for Ukrainians.