Section of Anthropology


Sandra L. Olsen, Ph.D., Curator
Section of Anthropology
Edward O'Neil Research Center
Museum of Natural History
5800 Baum Blvd.
Pittsburgh, PA 15206-3706
U.S.A.

 Adjunct Associate Research Professor of Anthropology
University of Pittsburgh

Office phone: (412) 665-2606
Fax: (412) 665-2751
Email: olsens@CarnegieMNH.org

 
  BOTAI: EARLY HORSE HERDERS ON THE STEPPES OF NORTHERN KAZAKHSTAN
 
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Since 1993, Sandra Olsen, Curator of Anthropology at Carnegie Museum of Natural History, has conducted archaeological fieldwork in northern Kazakhstan (Fig. 1). Dr. Bruce Bradley was Co-Director with Olsen, and Dr. Alan Outram was Assistant Director during the 2000-2002 expeditions. Bradley and Outram are both from the Archaeology Department at Exeter University. The goals of these joint Kazakh, American, and British expeditions are to study early horse domestication and recreate the lifestyles of the Botai culture horse pastoralists who lived 5,500 years ago (Fig. 2).


Fig. 1 - Excavations of a house pit at the Botai site of Vasilkovka
Fig. 2 - Kazakh breed of horses on the steppe in northern Kazakhstan

These recent investigations of the Copper Age Botai culture (3700-3100 BCE) reveal an unusual economy focused primarily on horses.


Fig. 3 - Tarpan, illus. by Daniel Pickering
The Botai culture is now seen as a crucial source of information for documenting horse domestication, one of the most seminal developments in human history. It provides the optimal case study for this elusive achievement because Botai sites are located in the heart of the native geographic range of the Tarpan, or European wild horse, Equus ferus, and date to the fourth millennium, sometime soon after it is thought horse domestication began (Fig. 3). Moreover, the Botai based their whole economy on the horse, and their large, permanent settlements have yielded enormous collections of horse remains. As a result, Botai sites provide an ideal opportunity for developing a multidisciplinary, holistic approach to research questions surrounding horse domestication.  

BOTAI: EARLY HORSE HERDERS ON THE STEPPES OF NORTHERN KAZAKHSTAN
by Sandra Olsen
Curator of Anthropology
Carnegie Museum of Natural History

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1.1 HORSES AND HUMANS
Humans owe more to horses than they do to any other domesticated animal. The roles of horses have evolved through time and continue to do so today. In the beginning horses were prey to Paleolithic hunters, providing them with large quantities of meat, bones, hide, and probably hair (Fig. 4). After horses were domesticated, they contributed many additional benefits: fermented mare’s milk (koumiss) (Fig. 5), means of transportation of people and goods (riding, draft, pack haulage), military service, ritual and status symbols, and participation in sports.

Curator Sandra Olsen and colleagues have discovered persuasive evidence from village sites of the Botai people that indicates horse domestication began as early as 5,500 years ago in Kazakhstan.


Fig. 4 - Solutre, France, site of more than 20,000 years of communal horse hunts, from 32,000 to 12,000 years ago
Fig. 5 - Kazakh mare milking at village of Kenetkul, 2002

1.2 THE BOTAI PEOPLE
The predecessors of the Botai were nomadic hunters of the steppe who took a variety of animals as their prey, including red deer, moose, aurochs (wild cattle), saiga antelope, and the horse. Their sites consist of shallow campsites with pottery sherds and stone tools and occasionally one or two small houses. This implies that they traveled in small bands and did not stay in one location for very long intervals.

Beginning sometime between 3700-3100 BCE, the Copper Age Botai Culture radically changed their lifestyle and settled in large, permanent villages. They also focused most of their economy on the horse, with more than 90% of the animal bones at their sites attributed to this species. Botai stone tools also changed dramatically, although the pottery was very similar to those of their ancestors.  

Fig. 6 - Site of Botai showing house pits as greener depressions
Fig. 7 - Map of Kazakhstan showing locations of Botai culture sites

The Botai lived in north-central Kazakhstan, within the drainage of the Ishim River, one of the major sources of water in this region (Fig. 6, Fig. 7). Only four Botai settlements have been identified: the largest one, Botai, for which the culture is named, Roshchinskoe, Krasnyi Yar, and Vasilkovka IV. They date to between 3700-3100 BCE, based on numerous AMS radiocarbon dates. Sandra Olsen’s research team has investigated Botai, as well as the two smaller villages of Krasnyi Yar and Vasilkovka IV, which are just 14 km apart.

1.3 RECENT EXCAVATIONS
In the 1980s and 1990’s, teams of archaeologists from the Petropavlovsk Pedagogical Institute (now Petropavlovsk University) excavated around 70 houses at Botai (Fig. 8.), and one house each at Krasnyi Yar, and Vasilkovka IV. Only surveys have been conducted at Roshchinskoe. Their work demonstrated that these sites were roughly contemporaneous and derived from the same culture, the Botai. Olsen’s work at Botai began in 1993 and continued until 1998. She co-directed excavations there in 1994-1995, excavating one house and a large bone midden.


Fig. 8 - Aerial photo of the site of Botai. Dark spots are ancient pit houses
Fig. 9 - Excavations at Krasnyi Yar

In 2000, a joint Kazakh-American team from the Carnegie Museum of Natural History and the Presidential Cultural Center of Kazakhstan initiated excavations at Krasnyi Yar, digging a third house and part of a fourth house (Fig. 9). Nearly all of the artifacts from the excavations

Fig. 10 - Landscape as seen from Zhartas Quarry
at Krasnyi Yar appear to be from the Copper Age. Krasnyi Yar is estimated to have a total area of 5 ha, compared to 9 ha for the site of Botai.

In 2001, the Neolithic campsite of Zhusan, located near Krasnyi Yar, was excavated and the stone quarry of Zhartas (Fig. 10) was located, mapped and evaluated. In 2002, at Vasilkovka IV (Fig. 1, above), one complete house and its surrounding ground surface were excavated and a large trench was dug through an additional house. Our excavations there also produced midden deposits from late 19th-early 20th century Kazakh herders’ camps filling the house depressions, as well as a small scatter of Neolithic material.

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