Two types of tombs in the northeastern necropolis of the Artezian settlement, excavation 12, 2019

Thе article features the results of excavations of the ancient tombs of the northeastern necropolis of the Artezian settlement in 2019. Twenty new burials dating to the turn of the I-II centuries CE were found, but they had been maraudered prior to the discovery. Among them are two types of tombs: earthen graves with shoulders and side tombs. These two types of burials displayed a significant difference in funeral rites. This points to a variery of features of the funeral and ritual practice associated with ethnic, social or religious factors, but the correlation still remains not completely clear. The noticeable predominance of tombs with shoulders over side tombs obviously corresponds to the proportional ratio of certain socioreligious or ethnic strata of the settlement’s population, that adhered to one or another burial tradition. In several such graves, some grave goods survived, most notable of which included three red-glazed single-horned lamps with relief images on the shield, red-glazed plates and a jug dating back to I-II centuries AD. Traces of funeral rites discovered at the necropolis had mixed Greek-barbarian features. The multi-ethnic origin of the local population corroborates with the latest finds of tombstones bearing inscriptions of names of Greek, Thracian, Iranian and Adyghe-Abkhazian origin. Despite the devastating scale of looting of the necropolis in modern times, the field works of 2019 managed to collect new data on the funeral rites of the population of the Artezian settlement and rescued a number of valuable artifacts for further research.