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The Scythian Wonder Deer : What Were These Golden Ornaments Really Used For?

Author(s): István Fodor
Subject(s): Archaeology, Ancient World, Cultural Anthropology / Ethnology
Published by: Molnár Kiadó
Summary/Abstract: In 19th-century southern Russia, extraordinarily rich early Scythian tombs (6th-7th c. B.C.) were discovered containing large golden deer. In one burial mound in the village of Kostromskaya, a figure of a deer supposedly lay on an iron shield. Researchers therefore drew the conclusion that the deer were shield ornaments, a view that was generally accepted up until only recently. Not long ago, however, Alekseev (1996), having analyzed the history and documentation of the earlier digs, made it clear that neither the deer, nor a golden panther that had also been found there were shield ornaments. He concluded that they are far more likely to have been decorations for the gorytos (bow and arrow case). It must be noted here, however, that the possibility that the Scythian golden deer were also gorytos ornaments was mentioned as early as 1934 in a book by Nándor Fettich, a noted Hungarian archeologist and goldsmith.

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