The unusual artifact has posed a mystery to archaeologists until they can figure out what culture created this figurine. The figurine was discovered in the ancient burial ground Tourist-2 on the eastern bank of the Ob River. It is reported by The Siberian Times.
Also unknown remains the material from which the figurine is made. But the most unusual thing is the headdress of the figurine. It is similar to the feather decoration worn by the North American Indians. Or maybe this is not a head ornament, but a divine halo, and thus this figurine depicts a deity?
Now researchers are carefully studying the find. It is curious that feather headdresses are not characteristic of local ancient cultures; nothing like this has yet been found in Siberia. Vyacheslav Molodin, a leading archaeologist at the Novosibirsk Institute of Archeology and Ethnography, called this and other finds made at the same place absolutely unique.
Other unusual finds include a figurine of a bird made of bone. According to Natalya Basova, most likely it was sewn over clothes and worn as a talisman, or maybe it was a pendant and was worn on a string around the neck.
Also found were four anthropomorphic (humanoid) figurines of mammoth tusk, birch, sandstone and unknown organic matter, which is now being established. These figures have holes, most likely they were sewn onto clothes. An elk figurine was also found.
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All the figurines were found not in the burial ground itself, but in the hole in the excavation. Another figurine has been recovered (from the shards). The figurines were probably used for ritual purposes.
In addition to all this, bone buckles and figurines, also anthropomorphic, were found in the male burials.
Preliminary dating of all finds gives the end of the third century BC, that is, the figures are at least 5 thousand years old. But in the same layer were found tools characteristic of the fourth millennium BC, that is, the figurines may not be 5, but 6 thousand years old.
Also in the burial ground were found items of the late Bronze Age of the Irmen culture and relatively fresh Turkic medieval burials. But the main culture of objects in the burial ground belongs to the Krotov culture (the developed Bronze Age - the end of the 3rd - 1st half of the 2nd millennium BC). It will take a lot of time for specialists to study all the artifacts.
Vyacheslav Molodin says that the finds are similar to the Okunev culture or the Samus culture, but the former has never reached these territories before, and the latter has a completely different funeral rite. Molodin is sure that such unusual and unique finds are worthy of placement in the Hermitage.