Samosdelka (russian: Самосделка) is a fishing village in southern Russia (about 40 km south-south-west of the city of
Astrakhan
Astrakhan ( rus, Астрахань, p=ˈastrəxənʲ) is the largest city and administrative centre of Astrakhan Oblast in Southern Russia. The city lies on two banks of the Volga, in the upper part of the Volga Delta, on eleven islands of the ...
) near which archaeologists reported in September 2008 that they had found the remains of
Atil
Atil (also Itil) , was the capital of the Khazar Khaganate from the middle of the 8th century until the end of the 10th century.
Known to have been situated on the Silk Road in the vicinity of the Caspian Sea, its precise location has long bee ...
, the capital of the medieval
Khazar kingdom.
Archaeology
A team of archaeologists, led by Dmitry Vasilyev of
Astrakhan State University, had been excavating for nine years. According to Vasilyev, they found the remains of an ancient brick fortress in the newly found 9th and 10th century layers, which contained characteristic Khazar
yurt
A yurt (from the Turkic languages) or ger ( Mongolian) is a portable, round tent covered and insulated with skins or felt and traditionally used as a dwelling by several distinct nomadic groups in the steppes and mountains of Central Asia ...
s. The investigated area covered more than 2 square kilometers. "This is a hugely important discovery ... We can now shed light on one of the most intriguing mysteries of that period – how the Khazars actually lived. We know very little about the Khazars – about their traditions, their funerary rites, their culture."
The layout of the city conforms to the written sources. As reported by
Norman Finkelshteyn, it was "a city bisected by riverbeds with a central island citadel of fired brick". The central portion of Samosdelka was located on an island between dried-up river beds. Old documents said that Atil's castle was located on an island in the center of the city.
The fortress at Samosdelka had a triangular shape was made from limestone bricks. It is known from written sources that the Khazar
khagan
Khagan or Qaghan (Mongolian:; or ''Khagan''; otk, 𐰴𐰍𐰣 ), or , tr, Kağan or ; ug, قاغان, Qaghan, Mongolian Script: ; or ; fa, خاقان ''Khāqān'', alternatively spelled Kağan, Kagan, Khaghan, Kaghan, Khakan, Khakhan ...
had a monopoly on brick buildings. Traces of a widespread fire were found at Samosdelka in an Atil layer. The fire was probably set during the conquest of Atil by
Kievan Rus'
Kievan Rusʹ, also known as Kyivan Rusʹ ( orv, , Rusĭ, or , , ; Old Norse: ''Garðaríki''), was a state in Eastern and Northern Europe from the late 9th to the mid-13th century.John Channon & Robert Hudson, ''Penguin Historical Atlas o ...
prince
Sviatoslav I in 968 or 969 CE.
Layers of 11th-12th centuries have
Oghuz artifacts and are associated with
Saqsin.
[Vasil’ev D. Preliminary results of researches on Samosdelskoye site in connection with oguz problem // European Association of Archaeologists. 9th annual meeting. Final program and abstracts. S.-Petersburg, 2003. Р. 29.]
Notes
External links
The Khazar Capital City of Atil
(Yediot Ahronot)
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Scholar claims to find medieval Jewish capital
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Khazar towns
Former populated places in Russia
Forts in Russia
Archaeological sites in Russia
Defunct towns in Russia
Cultural heritage monuments in Astrakhan Oblast
Objects of cultural heritage of Russia of federal significance
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