The burial of a child of the 2nd century AD was found by archaeologists in July 2017 at the ancient necropolis of Kyz-Aul in the east of Crimea: the members of the expedition dubbed it "the grave of an alien."
The uncommonness of the burial lies in the fact that, according to the barbarian tradition, the skull of the deceased was greatly deformed. According to the anthropologist, the child was no more than one and a half years old at the time of death. It is quite possible that the boy was destined to become a warrior, equestrian cataphractarian, defender of the Bosporus state in the future.
Deformation of the skulls is most often found in the Sarmatians, especially the late ones, and is one of the signs of their identification.
“It is known that the first finds of artificially deformed skulls were made by the founder of Bosporan archeology Paul Dubrux in 1826 in the necropolises of the Cimmerian Bosporus, in the Kerch region. The skull deformity was most likely carried out to indicate belonging to a group or to demonstrate social status,”archaeologists say.
Meanwhile, according to some researchers, this kind of change in the shape of the skull led to a change in a person's character, for example, to increased aggressiveness.
The Sarmatians, in whom the deformity of the skull was very common, were a militarized people and were distinguished by increased aggression.
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A molded vessel, small beads of paste glass and a bracelet of copper alloy were found near the child's skeleton.
In the layer where the "alien" was found, there are burials from the 1st century BC to the 3rd century AD. The monumental stone crypts, which are considered the tombs of the Sarmatized military nobility of the Bosporus kingdom, also belong to the same period.
Author: Natalia Turitsina