Sometimes, in order to discover the most real sensation, you do not need to go into the taiga jungle or climb mountain ridges. Amazing finds can be made, as they say, "right outside the outskirts." You just have to be very careful. This truth was once again convinced by the journalists of "Inform Polis", who left for the Ivolginskaya steppe.
Discovered by accident
The area again presented us with a surprise - just a few kilometers from Ulan-Ude, a real prehistoric "mining factory" was discovered, the age of which is measured in millennia. There are still stone millstones and worked slabs. All artifacts belong to the distant, pre-Hunnic era, the owners of the workshop could have been the steppe Scythians - representatives of the disappeared civilization of "tilers". It is possible that today this workshop is the only surviving quarry for the production of "Deer stones".
But that's not all! On one of the slabs, prints of an unknown creature were found. Judging by the shape and size of the footprint, it could have been made by a dinosaur!
About the mysterious place in the Ivolginskaya steppe, we were told by the local historian Lyubov Bairova and the chairman of the Sodruzhestvo RPO Erdem Zhamsuev. It is they who can be called the discoverers of the ancient workshop.
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Stone cutter workshop
We gasped when we arrived. Before us were dozens of huge boulders, the surface of which was covered with neat, even and deep enough potholes. How the ancient people knocked them out on the stones and how long it took them for this is unknown.
Note that we saw a similar ancient quarry during an expedition to the Zaigraevsky area. However, there are a number of differences. The holes knocked out on the stones are much larger and more accurate. Sometimes we found stone slabs with very large "teeth". The distance between the "slots" is the same, as if the ancient stonecutters used measuring instruments. In general, it sometimes seemed to us that the Ivolga stone cutters were working with some kind of special tools.
Maybe you are right. At least the technology was different from what we saw in the Dire Deep.
"Deer stones", millstones and the trail of a lizard
But the rest of the details were very similar. As in Zaigraevo, in the Ivolginskaya steppe there were "stone tables", and the whole area was literally covered with fragments of even stone slabs. Apparently, the stonecutters needed just such slabs for the construction of burial grounds.
As Lyubov Bairova explained to us, the assumption is due to the fact that there were once a large number of tiled graves in these places. By the way, one of the "Deer Stones", the best preserved of all, was taken to Irkutsk before the war and is an exhibit of the museum.
Not only slabs were made in the workshop. Every now and then came across stone circles, similar to millstones. This indicated that the ancient craftsmen made household utensils here. It is possible that plates and "millstones" are not the only items that can be found here. So archaeologists have something to work on. We were attracted by the mysterious round niches, which were literally burned out in some boulders. There was no doubt that the ancient masters burned them out - the edges of the niches were melted. But why did stone cutters need these niches? For a hearth, signal lights, or something completely different?
But most of all we were struck by the boulder, on which the imprint of a huge paw was clearly visible. As if a huge "bird" left a trail here. Or maybe a lizard?
It is known that in the world every now and then find fossilized prints of the tracks of ancient lizards in various sedimentary rocks or sand. And the boulder on which the imprint was visible, judging by the structure, just belonged to the sandstone stones. So it is possible that a trace of an ancient lizard was found in the suburb of Ulan-Ude! But, what is most surprising, next to the print of the "dinosaur" one could see the trace of the "palm", very similar to the print of a human hand … But we could not explain this in any way.
Steppe Scythians
The question of who built a real "factory" for the production of stone blocks, slabs and millstones in the steppe also remained unsolved. Considering that the "workshop" specialized in "Deer Stones", it can be assumed that the quarry belongs to the mysterious civilization of "tilers". Unfortunately, little is known about her. In addition, in Buryatia and Transbaikalia, there are few tiled graves left, most of them were looted. But in Mongolia, ancient graves have always been treated with care, which allowed scientists from different countries to study more closely the extinct culture. Experts came to the conclusion that the Mongolian "tilers" (and hence the Buryat, Tuvinian, and Altai), perhaps, are famous Scythians. This is evidenced by the finds in the places of residence of "tilers" and in their burials. There were found tools, weapons and household items,made in the famous "animal style" of the Scythians. Research on this topic is ongoing.
According to scientists, the Scythian Empire was located on a vast territory from the Danube to the Great Wall of China, controlling part of Europe and Asia (the Balkans, the Black Sea region, Siberia, Altai, Mongolia and China). That is, the "tilers" united the culture of the vast world of agricultural, nomadic and semi-nomadic tribes. And the Scythians, who lived even before our era, skillfully made metal forks and spoons, not only combat knives, but also kitchen knives, made needles, mirrors, decorated weapons and household utensils with bizarre patterns in the "animal style", sewed clothes and built houses. So the ancient "tilers" were not at all the wild nomads they are usually portrayed in literature. It was a highly developed civilization that emerged from the Mongolian steppes. It is interesting that the "tilers" were of a mixed anthropological type - they simultaneously belonged to Caucasians,and to the Mongoloids. Therefore, according to the researchers, the Scythians were the progenitors of both the Finno-Ugric tribes and all modern Mongolian peoples. However, the topic of the Scythians of Central Asia deserves a separate discussion. We will return to it in subsequent publications.
And the last thing. After some deliberation, we decided not to indicate the exact coordinates of the place where the ancient quarry is located. There is already garbage and dumps everywhere. What can happen after unorganized tourists rush to the Scythian "factory" is better not to imagine. We think that first this area should be taken under the protection of the region and the republic as a historical and archaeological monument. And only after the authorities put things in order there, the ancient workshop can be opened for tourists.
Leonid Actinov
