Ceramics of Sarovskii Stage of Altai Variant of Kulaiskaya Culture from Chudatskaya Gora Site (Based on the Materials of the State Hermitage Museum)

A ceramic complex which was typologically singled out from the materials of the Chudatskaya Gora site has been published for the first time in the article. The methodological principles underlying the identification of ceramic complexes features at various stages of the Altai variant of the Kulaiskaya culture have been characterized. The analysis of the complex under study, which was carried out according to a number of features (morphology, specifics of the ornamental composition) made it possible to attribute it to the Sarovskii stage of the Altai variant of the Kulaiskaya culture (lack of pot-shaped forms, the presence of cornices on the corollas, pearls not flattened from the inside, dense fractional ornament, combination of various ornamental elements, complex ornamental composition) and date it to the 1st century B.C. — 1st century A.D. The introduction of new sources into scientific circulation allows us to expand knowledge about this under-investigated period of the ancient history in the forest-steppe Altai. The published materials imply that the settlement of the area in the forest-steppe Altai by the tribes of the Kulaiskaya culture took place earlier than it was previously believed. The presence of other similar complexes indicates that it was not an episodic, single penetration, but the beginning of mass migration of Kulaiskaya culture tribes from the north to the forest-steppe Altai.