Museum complex

Skull with a “mask”

Bronze Age
Yamnaya (Pit) Culture
Bone, resinous substance, ochre
Inserts in the eye sockets 2.7 x 3.3 cm; insert into the nasal cavity 4.2 cm
Receipt: excavations under the supervision of V.P.Myshkin, 2005
Showcase 3

The "mask" is a mixture of a black resinous substance and red ochre found in eye sockets and nasal cavity of the skull of a 50-55-year-old man. Skull covered in red paint on its forehead, nose and lower jaw. Apparently, it was completely painted with ochre. Eyes of the deceased were covered with three round flagellums cobbled together at the top and bottom probably symbolizing the eyelids and the central piece symbolized the eyeball. The remnants of the substance in the nasal cavity retained the prints of the soft tissues of the nose and the fingerprints of the person who put the inserts into the nose, like plugs. The burial of a man with a mask is dated back to the XXXI Century BC.

More information...

Functional purpose: the mask would cover the skull of the buried in order to "protect" the deceased from any contact with the world of the "living".
Notice of uniqueness: the skull of a man with a "mask" is the oldest known in Northern Eurasia. Similar in type masks at this time are known only in the Front East, for example, in the Levant and Anatolia.

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