Захоронение бальзамированного воина XIII-XIV веков на левобережье Иртека

Abstract

In 2002 at the excavation of Shumaievskii II barrow burial ground located on the left bank of the Irtek river (the right inflow of the Ural river) a group of the Orenburg archeological expedition headed by N.L.Morgunova explored a burial of an embalmed warrior. The burial is a rich inhumation of the Turkic professional warrior, possibly a military leader of the 13th-14th cc., whose mortal remains they tried to conserve with the help of mercury to deliver them to some place remote from the place of death. As the pathologoanatomic examination has shown soft tissues had been removed from the warrior’s body and a clay coating containing mercury had been applied to his arms and legs bones. The head and the breast of the dead were wrapped in several layers of silk fabric. A similar clay coating containing mercury was applied on the head over the fabric. The technique of embalming using mercury and the presence of the alabaster coating reveal the connection of this burial with a group of people of the town settled center, probably located in Eastern Asia.