The Iman-Burluk 1, 2 sites and the Botai settlement: the solution to a source-related and historiographical problem

Abstract

The article focuses on the resolution of a long-standing source-related and historiographical problem in the study of the Eneolithic in North Kazakhstan, concerning the spatial relationship between the Iman-Burluk 1 and 2 sites, studied in 1970 under the direction of L.A. Chalaya, and the Botai settlement, discovered in 1980 and studied in detail under the direction of V.F. Zaibert, which is fundamental to the definition of the Botai culture. The research is based on the analysis of the archaeological excavation reports of the Iman-Burluk 1 and 2 sites and their published results, reports on the discovery and the first field excavations in the Botai settlement, and several published papers on their results. The analysis of the descriptive part and the examination of the graphic documentation of the Iman-Burluk 1 and 2 sites reveal contradictory information about their location. However, the comparison of the topographical plans of the Iman-Burluk 1 and 2 sites and the Botai settlement and the test description of the Iman-Burluk 1 and 2 sites with the topographical situation near the Nikolsko-Burlukskoe landmark suggests that these monuments are a single archaeological site. It was noted that in 1953 L.A. Chalaya mistakenly associated the location of the surface artefact collections of palaeontologist M.D. Biryukov with the Iman-Burluk 1 and 2 sites as one and the same monument. It is better to identify these sites only with the location of the finds, which the geologist G.Yu. Petrenko in 1958. From a historiographical point of view, the beginning of the archaeological exploration of the most important Eneolithic cultural monument of the Ishim region, the Botai settlement, should be dated to 1970, with the excavation of the Iman-Burluk 1 and 2 sites by the North Kazakh team of the Khakass Archaeological Expedition led by L.A. Chalaya. The first discovery of the site dates back to 1958 and was made by the geologist G.Yu. Petrenko. The first characterization of the eneolithic complex, which was later introduced to science as the Botai culture, was made in 1971 in the doctoral thesis of L.A. Chalaya. The NKAE began large-scale archaeological work at the site in 1980 under the direction of V.F. Zaibert.