Hardly anything about the Maykop Culture is uncontested by archeologists. There is disagreement even on the dating of the culture and on where cultural and technological innovations began. Some say the first kurgan burials were found in the Caucasus and spread to the steppe. What the DNA of the Steppe Maykop really means is also much discussed. The timing and location of the Proto-Indo-European language is also far from resolved. What's clear though is these cultures from the Zagros to Eastern Anatolia and from Mesopotamia through the Caucasus to the steppe were connected by a complex network. Some innovations spread so quickly it's hard to know where they originated. There is hardly anything in this video that is not contradicted somewhere but I have shared some of the sources in the description - David Anthony's book The Horse, the Wheel, and Language as ever is the foundational text for the amateur steppe-fancier but there are links to some open access papers on the subject too. It's a remarkable period and just fires the imagination. This is a time when Maikop and Cucuteni-Trypillia traders likely met in Yamnaya trading towns on the Dnieper - maybe getting there by the Black Sea - and on the Don while Uruk merchants and diplomats travelled up to Maikop. What would a steppe herder think of Uruk, I wonder? What would a Mesopotamian think of a Maykop village or one of the few steppe towns on the northern shores of the Euxine? Did the snobby, urban Uruk merchants think the Maikop barbarians - decked out in Mesopotamian bling - terribly gauche? Or were they frightened by them? This video is part of my series on the peoples of the Third Millennium BC (the Maikop do count - barely!): ua-cam.com/play/PLUyGT3KDxwC8u4jG_tOjN-8-bsHxucUxn.html If you've watched them, check out the Bronze Age Warfare series, you will like it too: ua-cam.com/video/LbIwi1HxmpE/v-deo.html
Mr. Dan being the the Mailkops bordered with the Yamnaya culture has anyone done a genetic analysis and comparison to see if the to groups were actually genetically the same people who culturally drifted do to environmental factors? The other factor being the borders were actually not just culture differences but genetic. I suspect the Maicop were intermediate with yamnaya dna as well as other cultures surrounding them or a completely different people with some shared ancestry .
The human figures remind me more of a "middle eastern" facial features though some of the images are crude and I'm not an expert. Maybe a genetic blend with the caucasians and Mesopotamia or a predated peoples who have shared dna with the 2 groups. Thier proximity to the Yamnaya would also suggest they also partially shared some ancestry before and after these cultures emerged though seemingly different genetically and certainly culturally!
The Yamnaya had some Caucasus ancestry yes but they were a genetically distinct people to the Maikop. As for the features of the figurines they are heavily stylised but they are distinctly Mesopotamian produced and of Mesopotamian people.
Is there any known connection between the cultural practice of ritual regicide*, and fatal arsenic poisoning through early bronze age arsenic-bronze production? * As discussed in Joseph Campbell's, Masks of God: Primitive Mythology.
The local legends call the the kages. A clan of dwarves that lived in the mountains and controlled the trade through the area until georgi, a local hero defeated them
I really appreciate the videos you're making: I'm a historian of the Caucasus by profession, so it makes me very happy to see such a high-quality video to inform people about this sadly neglected part of the ancient world. I'd also very much recommend Antonio Sagona's 'The Archaeology of the Caucasus' as a source, if you don't have it already. Any chance of a video on the Koban Culture in the future?
Thank you, I'm delighted you enjoyed it. I hope you weren't cringing too much at inaccuracies. My intention is to create a brief and simple narrative from the complicated history. Thank you for the recommendation. I will hopefully make more videos on the region eventually but not for a little while yet. It will give me a chance to read up on it at least. Cheers.
I'd love more research material about the Caucasus. They stand out through history as this critical link between cultures but it is so hard to find information on them.
John's suggestion Antonio Sagona's The Archaeology of the Caucasus is excellent (but I haven't quite finished it yet). I might be wrong but I think it's from the same press as the First Farmers of Europe by Stephen Shennan which is the best thing I've read in the last year or more. They're both great because they're detailed and scholarly but well written and require no prior knowledge. One thing I took away from the first half of Sagona's book is that it's complicated and much still isn't known for sure. I liked how clear he was about that.
@@DanDavisHistory No worries! The Bronze Age isn't my area of specialism but this seemed pretty good to me. My understanding is that there's a lot of argument between scholars about just how much influence Mesopotamian cultures had on the Maikop Culture, and archaeologists have been arguing about this since the 1890s when Veselovskii first published his results. But what you say is certainly a position lots of archaeologists have argued for. If you're interested in the Bronze Age Caucasus, there is a seminar tomorrow on cool rock art from Azerbaijan: you can register for it at ucl.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJAsdO-vrjMtGtZ-ZIr3zSNKL622JtKWL82X . You're also absolutely right about how complicated the evidence from the Caucasus is! I study the medieval period and even then there are massive questions about really basic things like how people defined ethnic identity.
Thank you very much. What an amazing part of the world to study. When I did Classics I was always fascinated by Colchis, this mysterious, mystical outpost of civilisation surrounded by strange eastern barbarism. It's been great to find out more about the reality of it as I got older but it's still so complicated that it remains mostly blank space to me. I'll get there in the end though.
Thank you for this video from grateful Circassian, sending you my best wishes in 2022 from Caucasus mountains, sir. It's peaceful beautiful night here today, and it's inspiring to think about these amazing people who lived in my homeland so many years ago. Definitely gonna learn more about this topic
Thank you so much for this video. I'm Georgian and love bronze age history but can barely find proper sources and detailed descriptions of my peoples past. I feel like it's a giant unsolved mystery which is ignored by my own people not to mention the rest of the world. Would love to see a video on Kura-araxis culture as well! Or the dozens of Megalithic city ruins scattered throughout the Caucasus.
@@Saylonn ზოგადად რასაც ვაკვირდები ინდო ევროპელების იქით არავინ არ ინტერესდება კაცობრიობის ისტორიაზე. იუთუბში განსაკუთრებით, ყველა მარტო არიანელების მიგრაციაზე ბაზრობს
it amazes me of all the groups of people that existed so long ago. it’s more interesting to me how this isn’t talked about more, keep up the great work i’m really enjoying all your videos
I have never heard of the Nuragic culture before. I didn’t take as much history in college as i should’ve so your videos always give me something new and interesting to look into.
The map of the Maykop culture overlaps very well with the traditional lands of the Circassian (or Adyghe) peoples before they were subjugated by the Russian empire in the Circassian genocide / expulsion. Genetic studies from 2018 also points to a genetic relationship between the Maykop people and modern Circassians. The Circassian languages (the Northwest Caucasian language family) are an ancient language family that is very distinctly non-Indoeuropean and has probably existed since the stone age in the same place. The mountaineous terrain of the Caucasus has helped people to preserve a few non-Indoeuropean isolated languages families that exist today. This linguistic geography give us a distinct clue to which kind of languages were spoken in all of Europe before the Indo-European invasion - probably there was a diversity of several languages that was not related to each other that would seem quite exotic to a modern European.
This really got me going! Such unknown cultures large ignored by mainstream European history - as far as I know, at least - yet seemingly key to understanding several aspects of our fundamental history better. You may have struck gold with this. I know I’m ready to expand my knowledge further if you delve deeper. Thanks for a spellbinding upload!
I really appreciate how much you frame your videos in the uncertainty of anthropology/archaeology. We have scattered incomplete evidence on nearly all fronts and hypotheses are all subject to change. You shy away from definite language and I applaud you. Keep up the good work brother.
The name “Maykop” remind me of the ruins in Crimea named “Mangup”. It was the capital of the Crimean Goths, the last Gothic people who did not go extinct til the 18th century whilst most others were extinct by the 10th century.
Another great video! It seems you keep digging up underrated cultures from the time around the Copper Age, like you're laying down pieces of a puzzle that most of us can't see yet. It has been clear to me for a while that the usual few cultures found in classic history books are at best the skeleton of our civilization, that the reality is far richer and more complex. Seeing someone who is far ahead of me in that understanding is quite inspiring!
Thank you very much. I'm just relaying what the academics have written! I agree with you than the reality is far richer and more complex. There are so many distinct cultures and peoples interacting even just on the steppe over a thousand years that it takes a while to get to grips with. I'm happy people seem to be enjoying the videos about them and I'll keep on making them until they don't any more.
Very well said. I agree wholeheartedly. I’ve worked in Near Eastern archaeology (Tel Akko in the 80’s), and the Mississippian Culture archaeology (Angel Mounds in the 2000’s) and these videos are brilliantly done and fill in a lot of significant gaps that usually get left out.
Again, I wish Ilearned more about these cultures in college I'm learning more from you than I did in Dr. Charles Lasher's History 101 at Notre Dame College in Manchester, New Hampshire between September and December 1980, Thank you.
The ancient Greeks colonized a region of northern Georgia called Abkhazia, starting ~1100 BC, but traces of much earlier pre-colonial contact exists in the form of small excavated settlements. The fall of the Maykop culture may not have been a fall at all, but one that transitioned from mountainous overland trade to the south, to working with costal trade networks. I like your pointing out that materials very to the Bronze age's existence came from the Caucuses.
Also the hording of wealth is interesting, from mining culture to mining business. The more people mine, the cheaper the material gets, which hurts the miners. So hoarding wealth to produce artificial scarcity would be useful, and a surplus would also occur as a matter of inter-tribe price collusion on the materials being mined.
the region you talk about ( btw that name was given at a much later date ) was part of kingdom of Colchis( western proto-Georgian kingdom ) long before any colonists :) ... Ancient Greeks just co-founded coastal cities ( like modern day Batumi, Poti, Sokhumi e.t.c.. ) for trading purposes( mainly gold export ) ...
Without long distance trade network of Mesopotamia, the ability of making bronze weapons and tools would vanish or drop heavily, so instead larger states with complex organization, peasants, miners, artisans, warriors you would get individual clans, and no magnificent kurgan and artifacts. So "civilization" would be gone and village level culture could continue. Perhaps like in dark age Greece, bards would recite epics about the ancestors...
I would imagine sea trade to have played a far more important role than often imagined, even at a much earlier date in human history. A French man proved in the early 50's you can cross the Atlantic in a dinghy without food, living on fish and drinking sea water. That latter part was eye opening, just don't wait until you are already dehydrated. Point is that early man can have had a much better grasp of how to use the resources at sea than later ones and be less vulnerable than those at sea. Australians have been walking about quite a while as well.
Yeah early sea faring is rather under examined because of the lack of evidence but we know our ancestors were making sea crossings in the deep past. Even homo erectus seems to have deliberately crossed straits, out of the sight of land, hundreds of thousands of years ago. Incredible to imagine it.
I noticed that many of the depictions of grave goods were sketched rather than photographed. I found this interesting because it reminded me of a book that was bought for me when I was a youngster. It was an edition of the Men At Arms series titled The Scythians. The book was printed when the Cold War interfered with east/west cooperation in academia. I recall reading the subtext of sketched images of Scythian bling and the author explaining that it wasn't possible for Western archaeolists to visit the sites of burial mounds in the Soviet Union only 'very old' drawings were available. Another fascinating video btw. Thankyou.
Every time you put up a new video, my reading list gets longer! It's these intermediary cultures that fascinates me - they serve as "the missing link" in the spread of material goods and their ideological correlates. Interesting info about arsenical bronze- that's news to me but answers the question of how bronze became so widespread before the reliable trade routes with tin- producing areas were created.
I had a line originally in the video where I said to us they're peripheral or serve as a link but of course to them they were at the centre of their own world. Exploiting the exotic wealthy strangers coming up from the south and the wild peoples to the north for their own ends, safe on their hilltops and terraces.
@@DanDavisHistory the point about farming on the hilltops made me stop and think, but perhaps defense was more important than ease of agricultural access.
Yeah there's not been a huge amount of work done on the settlements. For a hundred years everyone has wanted to excavate the kurgans. Even archeologists want to find the treasure. It's possible though that they did that thing many mountain folk do and they moved with the seasons between high and low pastures. So the high villages might have been occupied in summer only. Usually when you look at ancient peoples - lots of pigs means they were sedentary and no pigs means some level of transhumance because you can't really herd pigs like sheep and cattle. And the Maikop didn't tend to have many pigs. But there's just not enough to go on to know for sure. They were growing grain too so who knows.
I love your videos. Really well researched. There seems to have been a real shift in focus in recent years. 20 years ago, most lay-people who were interested in archaeology and prehistory were usually focused on iron-age Mesopotamia. But now there seems to be a new level of interest in the neolithic and bronze age.
@@DanDavisHistory Even though the new interest in archeogenetics might be partially driven by certain contemporary impulses which are, shall we say, a bit unsavoury (qua contemporary ethno-politics and resurgent ethno-nationalism). I remember reading a book by an American archaeologist about 20 years ago - "Patterns in Prehistory: Humankind's First Three Million Years" by Robert Wenke. I remember him saying that the academic convention was for ancient or prehistoric peoples to be classified ONLY by language, as we simply didn't have enough useful knowledge regarding their genetics. But I realize that, since then, new techniques have been developed regarding the tracing of genetic markers and specific mutations as a way of estimating when different pre-historic populations diverged.
Excellent work! Your channel is really helping me understand this wonderful but less examined time better. I hope we get more archeological evidence in the future!
I would love to learn more about the relationship hemp and other medicinal herbs may have played in religious and commercial lives of these prehistoric peoples. Great work btw! Your videos are vital to piecing the story of prehistory together for an independent researcher such as myself. The sources you decide to use are also first class
@@user-ms4cm4qf5j Herodotus mentions a few times about the Scythian (Indo-Aryans) inhalation of cannabis seed for instance. Also, throughout medieval history nomadic peoples on the steppe continued to use cannabis in form of hashish even after conversion to Islam. Although there isn’t any definite evidence, a pagan spirituality with rituals involving a little reefer ain’t that far fetched
Thanks for this very informative and well presented video. You obviously are a sincere and hard working person. I really do enjoy your well informed fact based videos.
Brilliant 👏 👏 👏 I've been researching for decades, and the information is all right here, it's coming so fast now, it's incomprehensible. BRAVO Sir. You have a new 4ever follower. Lol
What you said about the end of the Uruk period sounds really fascinating. What do we know about this time. I have never heard that the Kura-Araxes actually invaded northern Mesopotamia. For the origins of Sumerian many say that indeed there is no sign of a replacement of population or an immigration of another group, but then Sumerian has some affinities with the languages of the Caucasus, albeit small and due to the time scale of everything very fickle. Sumerian might also just have been already indigenous or migrated from the east, there was a similar shift between the Proto-Elamite culture and the Old Elamite culture. The theme of the end of the Uruk period also seems to repeat itself a thousand years later with the end of the Akkadian Empire and the invasion of the Gutians, once again trade into far away lands like Meluhha ends. Then after recovering again a thousand years later there was the Bronze Age collapse. In this way a period of far reaching trade is cut by a period of collapse.
though i keep hunting for material on various bronze age cultures and the steppe people in general, i have come across this important culture for the first time. It showed me how the important innovations of the steppes, like wagons (and warfare?) were encouraged by the demand for metal ores in the south (mesopotamia). so, once the metallurgy was solved by the settled people in the cities, it could have travelled to the steppes, where they came up with ideas like wagons and chariots, which were inspired by their local conditions....
I have been away from the internet for a couple of days and saw that a new video has been uploaded to this channel which made my day. I have been waiting for a channel that covered topics of this nature (aside from Survive the Jive) and here it is. This stuff is right in my wheelhouse. Recently picked up the novella prequel and Gods of Bronze part 1. I completed the prequel a couple days ago and currently on Chapter 2 of Bronze 1. Highly addictive by the way. Would like to make some suggestions if I may. Explore the early days of the Ancient Anatolians, maybe even explore the prehistoric structures and settlements there, (i.e. Gobekli Tepe, Nevali Cori, Catolhoyuk etc.). You could expand to the Mediterranean structures as I think they are all connected, even though the timeframes are quite expansive, such as the Temples of Malta, Giants Tombs of Sardinia. I believe all these structures are related even to the Western European structures such as New Grange and Stonehenge. I believe they were all built by the descendants of the Ancient Anatolians that expanded across Europe between 7500 and 5500 BP. Also I would like to see some exploration into the lives of the various hunter gatherer people that inhabited Europe prior to the arrive of the Anatolians and the Yamnaya. Much Speculation would be required but so what. Just more freedom for the author right? The fiction stuff is great but you might put out some nonfiction stuff as well. I would certainly be a buyer. I could go on and on but that's enough I suppose. We also need to get many more subs for this cannel. I'll do what I can to promote thats for sure.
Another good one mate. Incredible that artefacts of such precise resemblance to real objects and animals from so long ago. It seems like the bronze age had a kind of literal interpretation of objects for representation in art, which we don't see again until the Renaissance or so. (Thoroughly uneducated opinion here)
Yeah the explosion in artistic ability in Mesopotamia came from their society being able to support generations of professional artists. Egyptian art too and Minoan were amazing. Seems like the possibilities opened up by metal working really *fired* the imagination.
Great video. I love your channel. Those silver tubes you mentioned could be beer straws, which were common in Sumer, since beer vats had scum on top and course hops materials that sank to the bottom, so straws let you drink from the middle of the vat as you lounged around it. The elite generally used gold straws. If the tubes were not sealed well enabling air to escape, then being tent poles would make more sense as stated.
Came across your channel in the last few months and am enjoying it immensely. Very watchable and well put together, good blending of formats and alot of enthusiasm. I recon a 60 cm blade probably constitutes a shot sword, claim of oldest sword maybe right.
Amazing you have less than 6500 subscribers! Less than 5 minutes intro this one l liked subbed for all notices. Great job! And thanks to UA-cam's algorithms today!
The first known picture of the wagon (on ceramics) was found in Poland close to Cracov in Bronocice (3500 BC or earlier because C14 datating could underestimate the age of neotithic artifacts about 500 years or more, as we know from comparing with dendrochrological datating). Ceramics is a funnelbaker type. This is of course no poof that first wagons were invented in Poland, but we can assume that wagons were invented somewhere in Cucuteni-Tripillia culture or in some neighbouring cultures.
So it can be ascertained that many of these innovations have their earliest origins in the Caucasus and adjacent regions before later on reaching the Steppes. With people we know today as Caucasian Hunter-Gatherers. Truly fascinating stuff.
Not necessarily no. Many of the innovations appear in the archaeological record at basically the same time so no one knows where they originated. Eg the ard (the first plough) appears in the near east and northern Europe at the same time (within dating error margins). Where did they originate? No way to say for sure.
Wagons would have been more useful in the South of the Caucasus because of the desert environment in Mesopotamia and the Iranian plateau. So not only wagons but Indo-European languages entered th4 Steppe through the Caucasus from the SOUTH
Nice video again, I have read Anthony's book a view times, personally I was never convinced about the lasting influence of the Maykop culture. The oldest wheels (physical, tracks, depictions) are still coming from Western Europe as he also explains in his book. It feels to me like a attempt of archeologists to explain that 'culture' came from Mesopotamia, a narrative that takes a long time to get adjusted.
Thank you. Yeah I think the splendid art and wealth of material culture from Mesopotamia has often blinded people to technological innovations in wood and leather than don't survive and in cultural innovations that don't show much or at all in the archeological record - like horse riding or the koryos. One issue is accuracy in dating. The TRB wheel tracks and plough marks are roughly contemporaneous with evidence for wheels and the plough in the near east, or at least they are all within the margins of error for the dating so it's impossible to prove the place of invention. Wherever it was it spread very quickly. There is much disagreement about the importance of the Maikop. Some archeologists point out that it's the shiny stuff in the chief's graves that makes us believe they were significant but the people as a whole continued to live small and insignificant lives that didn't have much influence. But there is Maikop pottery and other material culture found in some steppe settlements, suggesting ongoing trade across the sea shores and up the great rivers. In Mikhailovka I on the Dnieper there may have been a Maikop population facilitating trade. And on the Don there is a suggestion of a small Maikop colony, again like a trading outpost. They did form a link of some kind between Mesopotamia and the steppe peoples.
@@Laotzu.Goldbug earliest wheel chariot is still found to be originally Sumerian. Although after some reconsideration about the Botai like a month or two months earlier, horses were found to be domesticated in EASTERN Europe and my comment was about 6 months ago so I gladly accept the new evidences. Now if you have anything that disapproves the first one, do send.
@@Laotzu.Goldbug Not only does the archeological evidence disagree with the Botai culture domesticating horses but the Genetic and Isotope evidence also disagrees with the premise of the Botai ever Domesticating the horse. There is evidence that they hunted and consumed horse meat. But there is much clear Isotope evidence present in Yamnaya teeth that they were consuming horse raw milk which means they were probably also herding the horses.
Great work here Dan. Your style is so relatable and respectful, and, very importantly, not pushing a particular theory or conclusive analysis when the evidence just isn't in. First saw your vids about a fortnight ago and I'm hooked on you man. Haven't ever seen your books second-hand in my travels but I'll keep an eye out for your name as I think I'd absolutely love them. Question: Were horses known to have been used by any other peoples or cultures before this time period where they seem so integral already to the Maikop? Also, with the peoples of Mesopotamia and wider environs embroiled in cultural and factional spats for a long time previous to the Maikop period, why do you think there wasn't more migration by the southern cultures north and west to greener pastures, say, to beyond the Carpathians? ie. not too far via the water highway? Do you think these areas were defended against migrations somehow? Or that it well could have occurred in a trickle fashion? Or otherwise? Would love to hear your thoughts? Thanks so much for the time and effort you put into these great productions. Cheers mate Michael Barrett
Thank you Michael, I appreciate it. The exact time and place of horse domestication is unknown. It may have been by the Sredny Stog culture which was on the western end of the steppe around the Dnieper. Do you mean why didn't mesopotamians migrate into the steppe and eastern Europe? They had no need to, their own homeland was the place their culture was adapted to, and they had no ability to, they could only really survive where they were by managing the water to grow crops. The later migrations by steppe people were facilitated by their already-mobile culture and the geography and climate of Europe.
About the Carpathian mountains culture you should check the Cucuteni Trypillian culture, much older than the Caucasian one. It's even considerate posibil to be disappeared spreading around the Black sea. In this particularly case Wikipedia seems to cover pretty well the subject.
Dan I’m reading your free book and I like it. Appreciate your videos and haven’t yet read your other works but what’s missing is an almanac or glossary of the first cultures…the yamnaya, cucuteni, terremare. The world to our consciousness begins with the crescent cultures, Akkadians, Babylonians etc. and rest seem to have very little on them.
Very good videos, it really sends you back in time. I can imagine these people. Please make a video about proto uralic/ugric people. There's no good quality videos on the topic.
BTW maykop were created by people who went there from today's Georgia's territory(Imereti region). you can search that. This sphere is so new we get more information every year.
Thankyou for yet another great video about a lesser known ancient culture. You're doing a great job not letting this information and their history get forgotten. 👏 🤩
According to Google Maps, you don't want to walk from Babylon to Maikop. You hike up to Trebizond, then hop on a ship to cross the Black Sea. Thanks, Trebizond!
Fascinating, maybe the Unetice culture in Central Europe is a successor of the Maykop or Southern Yamnaya people. Have you mentioned them before? They seem to be mainly responsible for bringing the R1b haplogroup to Central and Western Europe. The Unetice culture had excellent metal skills (Nebra sky disk) and is suspected to be the forerunner of the Celtic, Italic and Germanic languages. "The archeological and genetic evidence (distribution of R1b subclades) point at several consecutive waves towards eastern and central Germany between 2800 BCE and 2300 BCE. The Unetice culture was probably the first culture in which R1b-L11 lineages played a major role. It is interesting to note that the Unetice period happen to correspond to the end of the Maykop (2500 BCE) and Kemi Oba (2200 BCE) cultures on the northern shores of the Black Sea, and their replacement by cultures descended from the northern steppes. It can therefore be envisaged that the (mostly) R1b population from the northern half of the Black Sea migrated westward due to pressure from other Indo-European people (R1a) from the north, for example that of the burgeoning Proto-Indo-Iranian branch, linked to the contemporary Poltavka and Abashevo cultures." www.eupedia.com/europe/Haplogroup_R1b_Y-DNA.shtml en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unetice_culture
Yeah it's a fascinating and enormously complex period. I haven't got anywhere near to the Unetice period yet and won't for quite some time but we'll get there eventually. Cheers.
The Black Sea flooded and civilisations from around the lake moved.Oldest european civilisation its Hamangia on the Black Sea in Romania and Bulgaria with the famous sculpture ,,the thinker,,. More rwlics can be found on the Black Sea bottom as it its anoxic at depth and even wood stays preserved like new.
Hardly anything about the Maykop Culture is uncontested by archeologists. There is disagreement even on the dating of the culture and on where cultural and technological innovations began. Some say the first kurgan burials were found in the Caucasus and spread to the steppe. What the DNA of the Steppe Maykop really means is also much discussed. The timing and location of the Proto-Indo-European language is also far from resolved.
What's clear though is these cultures from the Zagros to Eastern Anatolia and from Mesopotamia through the Caucasus to the steppe were connected by a complex network. Some innovations spread so quickly it's hard to know where they originated. There is hardly anything in this video that is not contradicted somewhere but I have shared some of the sources in the description - David Anthony's book The Horse, the Wheel, and Language as ever is the foundational text for the amateur steppe-fancier but there are links to some open access papers on the subject too.
It's a remarkable period and just fires the imagination. This is a time when Maikop and Cucuteni-Trypillia traders likely met in Yamnaya trading towns on the Dnieper - maybe getting there by the Black Sea - and on the Don while Uruk merchants and diplomats travelled up to Maikop. What would a steppe herder think of Uruk, I wonder? What would a Mesopotamian think of a Maykop village or one of the few steppe towns on the northern shores of the Euxine? Did the snobby, urban Uruk merchants think the Maikop barbarians - decked out in Mesopotamian bling - terribly gauche? Or were they frightened by them?
This video is part of my series on the peoples of the Third Millennium BC (the Maikop do count - barely!): ua-cam.com/play/PLUyGT3KDxwC8u4jG_tOjN-8-bsHxucUxn.html
If you've watched them, check out the Bronze Age Warfare series, you will like it too: ua-cam.com/video/LbIwi1HxmpE/v-deo.html
Mr. Dan being the the Mailkops bordered with the Yamnaya culture has anyone done a genetic analysis and comparison to see if the to groups were actually genetically the same people who culturally drifted do to environmental factors? The other factor being the borders were actually not just culture differences but genetic. I suspect the Maicop were intermediate with yamnaya dna as well as other cultures surrounding them or a completely different people with some shared ancestry .
The human figures remind me more of a "middle eastern" facial features though some of the images are crude and I'm not an expert. Maybe a genetic blend with the caucasians and Mesopotamia or a predated peoples who have shared dna with the 2 groups. Thier proximity to the Yamnaya would also suggest they also partially shared some ancestry before and after these cultures emerged though seemingly different genetically and certainly culturally!
The Yamnaya had some Caucasus ancestry yes but they were a genetically distinct people to the Maikop.
As for the features of the figurines they are heavily stylised but they are distinctly Mesopotamian produced and of Mesopotamian people.
Is there any known connection between the cultural practice of ritual regicide*, and fatal arsenic poisoning through early bronze age arsenic-bronze production?
* As discussed in Joseph Campbell's, Masks of God: Primitive Mythology.
@@timwrigley102 not as far as I know. I doubt the kings got anywhere near the smelting process.
So we got a people of great Smiths, living in the moutains and mining precious materials... Wait were those Dwarves ???
The local legends call the the kages. A clan of dwarves that lived in the mountains and controlled the trade through the area until georgi, a local hero defeated them
Stunted by the arsenic, and lead and mercury.
I really appreciate the videos you're making: I'm a historian of the Caucasus by profession, so it makes me very happy to see such a high-quality video to inform people about this sadly neglected part of the ancient world. I'd also very much recommend Antonio Sagona's 'The Archaeology of the Caucasus' as a source, if you don't have it already. Any chance of a video on the Koban Culture in the future?
Thank you, I'm delighted you enjoyed it. I hope you weren't cringing too much at inaccuracies. My intention is to create a brief and simple narrative from the complicated history. Thank you for the recommendation. I will hopefully make more videos on the region eventually but not for a little while yet. It will give me a chance to read up on it at least. Cheers.
I'd love more research material about the Caucasus. They stand out through history as this critical link between cultures but it is so hard to find information on them.
John's suggestion Antonio Sagona's The Archaeology of the Caucasus is excellent (but I haven't quite finished it yet). I might be wrong but I think it's from the same press as the First Farmers of Europe by Stephen Shennan which is the best thing I've read in the last year or more. They're both great because they're detailed and scholarly but well written and require no prior knowledge.
One thing I took away from the first half of Sagona's book is that it's complicated and much still isn't known for sure. I liked how clear he was about that.
@@DanDavisHistory No worries! The Bronze Age isn't my area of specialism but this seemed pretty good to me. My understanding is that there's a lot of argument between scholars about just how much influence Mesopotamian cultures had on the Maikop Culture, and archaeologists have been arguing about this since the 1890s when Veselovskii first published his results. But what you say is certainly a position lots of archaeologists have argued for. If you're interested in the Bronze Age Caucasus, there is a seminar tomorrow on cool rock art from Azerbaijan: you can register for it at ucl.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJAsdO-vrjMtGtZ-ZIr3zSNKL622JtKWL82X . You're also absolutely right about how complicated the evidence from the Caucasus is! I study the medieval period and even then there are massive questions about really basic things like how people defined ethnic identity.
Thank you very much. What an amazing part of the world to study. When I did Classics I was always fascinated by Colchis, this mysterious, mystical outpost of civilisation surrounded by strange eastern barbarism. It's been great to find out more about the reality of it as I got older but it's still so complicated that it remains mostly blank space to me. I'll get there in the end though.
This channel is going to blow up. The visual and information quality is crazy good!
Thanks very much, let's hope so.
I'm so glad Tom Rowsel recommended this channel
Me too!
“Bronze Age Kings of the Caucasus”...that’s gonna be the name of my rock band.
Are u sure its not a metal band then?😎
It's new genre called an
Arsenic Band
I was born in maykop, a week before the date this vid was posted.
That’s a gift for sure
Thank you for this video from grateful Circassian, sending you my best wishes in 2022 from Caucasus mountains, sir. It's peaceful beautiful night here today, and it's inspiring to think about these amazing people who lived in my homeland so many years ago. Definitely gonna learn more about this topic
Adyghe wey wey!!!
So glad I found this channel, once in while youtube actually recommends something really good.
Thank you, I'm glad you found it too.
Thank you so much for this video. I'm Georgian and love bronze age history but can barely find proper sources and detailed descriptions of my peoples past. I feel like it's a giant unsolved mystery which is ignored by my own people not to mention the rest of the world.
Would love to see a video on Kura-araxis culture as well! Or the dozens of Megalithic city ruins scattered throughout the Caucasus.
Thanks for watching and for your suggestions.
Agreed! Fascinating!
Am yles J Haplogroupebi ar evaseba
Amis info evropel Ojaxshi shevateslet mtelma kizikma
@@Saylonn ზოგადად რასაც ვაკვირდები ინდო ევროპელების იქით არავინ არ ინტერესდება კაცობრიობის ისტორიაზე. იუთუბში განსაკუთრებით, ყველა მარტო არიანელების მიგრაციაზე ბაზრობს
@@akaking7499 Hand to Hand combat ar Sheudzliat, Ra mouvidat n sarmatielebs aghm kavkasiashi?
Kalebi aaxies da kacebi daxoces
Hello from Pakistan.
I appreciate the effort you've invested in making such a remarkable history stuff.
Excellent!
Hello, thanks for watching, glad you're enjoying the channel.
it amazes me of all the groups of people that existed so long ago. it’s more interesting to me how this isn’t talked about more, keep up the great work i’m really enjoying all your videos
Thank you.
Thanks I just want to say first time I listened truly nicely presented history and culture of Caucasus people respect you and your work
A comment for the algorithm- great job! 🇸🇪
I have never heard of the Nuragic culture before. I didn’t take as much history in college as i should’ve so your videos always give me something new and interesting to look into.
The map of the Maykop culture overlaps very well with the traditional lands of the Circassian (or Adyghe) peoples before they were subjugated by the Russian empire in the Circassian genocide / expulsion. Genetic studies from 2018 also points to a genetic relationship between the Maykop people and modern Circassians. The Circassian languages (the Northwest Caucasian language family) are an ancient language family that is very distinctly non-Indoeuropean and has probably existed since the stone age in the same place.
The mountaineous terrain of the Caucasus has helped people to preserve a few non-Indoeuropean isolated languages families that exist today. This linguistic geography give us a distinct clue to which kind of languages were spoken in all of Europe before the Indo-European invasion - probably there was a diversity of several languages that was not related to each other that would seem quite exotic to a modern European.
This really got me going! Such unknown cultures large ignored by mainstream European history - as far as I know, at least - yet seemingly key to understanding several aspects of our fundamental history better. You may have struck gold with this. I know I’m ready to expand my knowledge further if you delve deeper. Thanks for a spellbinding upload!
I really appreciate how much you frame your videos in the uncertainty of anthropology/archaeology. We have scattered incomplete evidence on nearly all fronts and hypotheses are all subject to change. You shy away from definite language and I applaud you. Keep up the good work brother.
This channel is so underrated
Thank you, I hope it becomes correctly rated eventually.
The name “Maykop” remind me of the ruins in Crimea named “Mangup”. It was the capital of the Crimean Goths, the last Gothic people who did not go extinct til the 18th century whilst most others were extinct by the 10th century.
Another great video! It seems you keep digging up underrated cultures from the time around the Copper Age, like you're laying down pieces of a puzzle that most of us can't see yet. It has been clear to me for a while that the usual few cultures found in classic history books are at best the skeleton of our civilization, that the reality is far richer and more complex. Seeing someone who is far ahead of me in that understanding is quite inspiring!
Thank you very much. I'm just relaying what the academics have written! I agree with you than the reality is far richer and more complex. There are so many distinct cultures and peoples interacting even just on the steppe over a thousand years that it takes a while to get to grips with. I'm happy people seem to be enjoying the videos about them and I'll keep on making them until they don't any more.
Very well said. I agree wholeheartedly. I’ve worked in Near Eastern archaeology (Tel Akko in the 80’s), and the Mississippian Culture archaeology (Angel Mounds in the 2000’s) and these videos are brilliantly done and fill in a lot of significant gaps that usually get left out.
It's so cool to see quality videos on such underrated and fascinating topics. Thank you!
Thank you for watching, it's great to know you enjoyed it.
Fascinating subject matter that is presented brilliantly. Very, very well done. Thank you!
I just randomly had this show up in my recommendations from YT and I'm so happy it did! 😁 Amazing video. Can't wait to binge
I'm happy you found us, welcome to the channel.
Again, I wish Ilearned more about these cultures in college I'm learning more from you than I did in Dr. Charles Lasher's History 101 at Notre Dame College in Manchester, New Hampshire between September and December 1980, Thank you.
Amazing burial description. Thanks Dan, for the outstanding presentation.
Came back to listen to this all over again because why not 😁 great content
Great presentation and thanks for sharing. Chris
Thanks Chris.
The ancient Greeks colonized a region of northern Georgia called Abkhazia, starting ~1100 BC, but traces of much earlier pre-colonial contact exists in the form of small excavated settlements. The fall of the Maykop culture may not have been a fall at all, but one that transitioned from mountainous overland trade to the south, to working with costal trade networks. I like your pointing out that materials very to the Bronze age's existence came from the Caucuses.
Also the hording of wealth is interesting, from mining culture to mining business. The more people mine, the cheaper the material gets, which hurts the miners. So hoarding wealth to produce artificial scarcity would be useful, and a surplus would also occur as a matter of inter-tribe price collusion on the materials being mined.
the region you talk about ( btw that name was given at a much later date ) was part of kingdom of Colchis( western proto-Georgian kingdom ) long before any colonists :) ...
Ancient Greeks just co-founded coastal cities ( like modern day Batumi, Poti, Sokhumi e.t.c.. ) for trading purposes( mainly gold export ) ...
Without long distance trade network of Mesopotamia, the ability of making bronze weapons and tools would vanish or drop heavily, so instead larger states with complex organization, peasants, miners, artisans, warriors you would get individual clans, and no magnificent kurgan and artifacts. So "civilization" would be gone and village level culture could continue. Perhaps like in dark age Greece, bards would recite epics about the ancestors...
Excellent video, as always. It's good to see people starting to wake up to how good this channel is.
Another wonderful video. Will be rewatching for sure.
I would imagine sea trade to have played a far more important role than often imagined, even at a much earlier date in human history. A French man proved in the early 50's you can cross the Atlantic in a dinghy without food, living on fish and drinking sea water. That latter part was eye opening, just don't wait until you are already dehydrated. Point is that early man can have had a much better grasp of how to use the resources at sea than later ones and be less vulnerable than those at sea. Australians have been walking about quite a while as well.
Yeah early sea faring is rather under examined because of the lack of evidence but we know our ancestors were making sea crossings in the deep past. Even homo erectus seems to have deliberately crossed straits, out of the sight of land, hundreds of thousands of years ago. Incredible to imagine it.
Are you thinking of Thor Heyerdahl?
He made it from North Africa to the Caribbean in his reed boat
@@Laotzu.Goldbug It was The Ra expedition, first the Kon Tiki,and he was never alone.
@@ver_idem yes I was thinking of Ra II. I'm not sure who the Frenchman being referred to in the original comment was though.
I noticed that many of the depictions of grave goods were sketched rather than photographed. I found this interesting because it reminded me of a book that was bought for me when I was a youngster.
It was an edition of the Men At Arms series titled The Scythians. The book was printed when the Cold War interfered with east/west cooperation in academia. I recall reading the subtext of sketched images of Scythian bling and the author explaining that it wasn't possible for Western archaeolists to visit the sites of burial mounds in the Soviet Union only 'very old' drawings were available.
Another fascinating video btw.
Thankyou.
This is extremely interesting. Thanks.
I love ancient history! Thank you!!!!
Every time you put up a new video, my reading list gets longer! It's these intermediary cultures that fascinates me - they serve as "the missing link" in the spread of material goods and their ideological correlates.
Interesting info about arsenical bronze- that's news to me but answers the question of how bronze became so widespread before the reliable trade routes with tin- producing areas were created.
I had a line originally in the video where I said to us they're peripheral or serve as a link but of course to them they were at the centre of their own world. Exploiting the exotic wealthy strangers coming up from the south and the wild peoples to the north for their own ends, safe on their hilltops and terraces.
@@DanDavisHistory the point about farming on the hilltops made me stop and think, but perhaps defense was more important than ease of agricultural access.
Yeah there's not been a huge amount of work done on the settlements. For a hundred years everyone has wanted to excavate the kurgans. Even archeologists want to find the treasure.
It's possible though that they did that thing many mountain folk do and they moved with the seasons between high and low pastures. So the high villages might have been occupied in summer only.
Usually when you look at ancient peoples - lots of pigs means they were sedentary and no pigs means some level of transhumance because you can't really herd pigs like sheep and cattle. And the Maikop didn't tend to have many pigs.
But there's just not enough to go on to know for sure. They were growing grain too so who knows.
Can't get enough of these videos on early civilizations! I'd love to see some sort of annotated map of these early societies or something similar.
Great idea! You could do it based on these videos.
I love your videos. Really well researched. There seems to have been a real shift in focus in recent years. 20 years ago, most lay-people who were interested in archaeology and prehistory were usually focused on iron-age Mesopotamia. But now there seems to be a new level of interest in the neolithic and bronze age.
Thank you, I appreciate that. You're right, there's been a lot of work in these areas in the last 20 years - archeogenetics especially.
@@DanDavisHistory Even though the new interest in archeogenetics might be partially driven by certain contemporary impulses which are, shall we say, a bit unsavoury (qua contemporary ethno-politics and resurgent ethno-nationalism). I remember reading a book by an American archaeologist about 20 years ago - "Patterns in Prehistory: Humankind's First Three Million Years" by Robert Wenke. I remember him saying that the academic convention was for ancient or prehistoric peoples to be classified ONLY by language, as we simply didn't have enough useful knowledge regarding their genetics. But I realize that, since then, new techniques have been developed regarding the tracing of genetic markers and specific mutations as a way of estimating when different pre-historic populations diverged.
This is top quality content. I enjoyed every second of it!
Excellent work! Your channel is really helping me understand this wonderful but less examined time better. I hope we get more archeological evidence in the future!
Thank you very much. I hope so too.
This was SO SO SO GOOD!
Love the work you’re doing.
Thank you.
You just opened a set of answers to questions I’ve had for a long time. Of course now there are new questions, but totally great channel!!!
Thank you.
Thank you for sharing these videos.
Im learning so much.
Thank you for your hardwork, really enjoyed every programme you've made.
I would love to learn more about the relationship hemp and other medicinal herbs may have played in religious and commercial lives of these prehistoric peoples. Great work btw! Your videos are vital to piecing the story of prehistory together for an independent researcher such as myself. The sources you decide to use are also first class
@@user-ms4cm4qf5j Herodotus mentions a few times about the Scythian (Indo-Aryans) inhalation of cannabis seed for instance. Also, throughout medieval history nomadic peoples on the steppe continued to use cannabis in form of hashish even after conversion to Islam. Although there isn’t any definite evidence, a pagan spirituality with rituals involving a little reefer ain’t that far fetched
@@user-ms4cm4qf5j it was a hotbox
Thanks for this very informative and well presented video. You obviously are a sincere and hard working person. I really do enjoy your well informed fact based videos.
Thank you for watching!
Brilliant 👏 👏 👏 I've been researching for decades, and the information is all right here, it's coming so fast now, it's incomprehensible. BRAVO Sir. You have a new 4ever follower. Lol
This is a wonderful video thank you so much for taking the time to do this
Thank you for watching, I'm glad you like the channel.
Just subscribed! What a pleasant voice to listen to on my walks!
Thank you so much, welcome to the channel, Savannah.
What you said about the end of the Uruk period sounds really fascinating. What do we know about this time. I have never heard that the Kura-Araxes actually invaded northern Mesopotamia. For the origins of Sumerian many say that indeed there is no sign of a replacement of population or an immigration of another group, but then Sumerian has some affinities with the languages of the Caucasus, albeit small and due to the time scale of everything very fickle. Sumerian might also just have been already indigenous or migrated from the east, there was a similar shift between the Proto-Elamite culture and the Old Elamite culture.
The theme of the end of the Uruk period also seems to repeat itself a thousand years later with the end of the Akkadian Empire and the invasion of the Gutians, once again trade into far away lands like Meluhha ends. Then after recovering again a thousand years later there was the Bronze Age collapse. In this way a period of far reaching trade is cut by a period of collapse.
Awesome! Watched it twice 😊!!
Awesome! Glad you liked it. Check out the others on the channel if you haven't already.
though i keep hunting for material on various bronze age cultures and the steppe people in general, i have come across this important culture for the first time. It showed me how the important innovations of the steppes, like wagons (and warfare?) were encouraged by the demand for metal ores in the south (mesopotamia). so, once the metallurgy was solved by the settled people in the cities, it could have travelled to the steppes, where they came up with ideas like wagons and chariots, which were inspired by their local conditions....
Thanks for sharing your research and not putting forward a single theory as 'the one'! It's refreshing.
Your videos got me interested in your books. Thanks for the dedication to detail
Wonderful stuff brother.
Love the visuals in your pieces.
Thank you.
Fantastic video. Thank you!
Glad you liked it! Thanks for watching.
I have been away from the internet for a couple of days and saw that a new video has been uploaded to this channel which made my day. I have been waiting for a channel that covered topics of this nature (aside from Survive the Jive) and here it is. This stuff is right in my wheelhouse. Recently picked up the novella prequel and Gods of Bronze part 1. I completed the prequel a couple days ago and currently on Chapter 2 of Bronze 1. Highly addictive by the way. Would like to make some suggestions if I may. Explore the early days of the Ancient Anatolians, maybe even explore the prehistoric structures and settlements there, (i.e. Gobekli Tepe, Nevali Cori, Catolhoyuk etc.). You could expand to the Mediterranean structures as I think they are all connected, even though the timeframes are quite expansive, such as the Temples of Malta, Giants Tombs of Sardinia. I believe all these structures are related even to the Western European structures such as New Grange and Stonehenge. I believe they were all built by the descendants of the Ancient Anatolians that expanded across Europe between 7500 and 5500 BP. Also I would like to see some exploration into the lives of the various hunter gatherer people that inhabited Europe prior to the arrive of the Anatolians and the Yamnaya. Much Speculation would be required but so what. Just more freedom for the author right? The fiction stuff is great but you might put out some nonfiction stuff as well. I would certainly be a buyer. I could go on and on but that's enough I suppose. We also need to get many more subs for this cannel. I'll do what I can to promote thats for sure.
Awesome, so glad you're enjoying the series. Thanks for your suggestions.
Another excellent video! Thank you! Great job!
Thank you!
I only found this channel recently. Very glad I did! Great content. I'll have to get a copy of your book soon.
Thanks, I'm glad you found the channel too, welcome.
Thanks so much - what a luck to find such a good content!
Thank you for watching, welcome to the channel!
Magnificent video, thank you :)
What an extraordinary channel!
Another good one mate. Incredible that artefacts of such precise resemblance to real objects and animals from so long ago. It seems like the bronze age had a kind of literal interpretation of objects for representation in art, which we don't see again until the Renaissance or so. (Thoroughly uneducated opinion here)
Yeah the explosion in artistic ability in Mesopotamia came from their society being able to support generations of professional artists. Egyptian art too and Minoan were amazing. Seems like the possibilities opened up by metal working really *fired* the imagination.
@@DanDavisHistory badum tsss
Don't try this at home, I'm a professional.
This is so cool, thank you!
Thanks for watching, glad you liked the video. Check out the others on the channel if you haven't already.
Love these vids. Thank you for all the hard work you've done on them.
Thank you Bro, I appreciate it!
New to your channel. I LOVE that you include DNA evidence.
I really look forward to these videos. I am currently reading Thunderer, and love the series. Keep up the good work.
I'm so pleased you're enjoying the stories and the videos, that's ideal. Cheers.
He's only gone and dropped yet another banger
Cheers bro, glad you liked it. I wondered if people would find it boring.
@@DanDavisHistory doesn't look like it going off the viewcount/like ratio
Great video. I love your channel. Those silver tubes you mentioned could be beer straws, which were common in Sumer, since beer vats had scum on top and course hops materials that sank to the bottom, so straws let you drink from the middle of the vat as you lounged around it. The elite generally used gold straws. If the tubes were not sealed well enabling air to escape, then being tent poles would make more sense as stated.
I believe it's the large diameter that differentiates these from drinking straws.
Came across your channel in the last few months and am enjoying it immensely. Very watchable and well put together, good blending of formats and alot of enthusiasm. I recon a 60 cm blade probably constitutes a shot sword, claim of oldest sword maybe right.
Thank you very much Paul.
Amazing you have less than 6500 subscribers! Less than 5 minutes intro this one l liked subbed for all notices. Great job! And thanks to UA-cam's algorithms today!
Thank you, welcome to the channel, we're glad you found us. Cheers.
The first known picture of the wagon (on ceramics) was found in Poland close to Cracov in Bronocice (3500 BC or earlier because C14 datating could underestimate the age of neotithic artifacts about 500 years or more, as we know from comparing with dendrochrological datating). Ceramics is a funnelbaker type. This is of course no poof that first wagons were invented in Poland, but we can assume that wagons were invented somewhere in Cucuteni-Tripillia culture or in some neighbouring cultures.
These are awesome. Thank you!!
I'm glad you like them, thanks. Let me know if there's a specific culture you'd like to see in future. Cheers.
@@DanDavisHistory Did you ever do one on Cossack culture?
Those burials are insanely lavish, and to think they are 5000 years old. It boggles the mind.
Dan Thank You. Great information
Thanks for watching.
So it can be ascertained that many of these innovations have their earliest origins in the Caucasus and adjacent regions before later on reaching the Steppes. With people we know today as Caucasian Hunter-Gatherers. Truly fascinating stuff.
Not necessarily no. Many of the innovations appear in the archaeological record at basically the same time so no one knows where they originated. Eg the ard (the first plough) appears in the near east and northern Europe at the same time (within dating error margins). Where did they originate? No way to say for sure.
Wagons would have been more useful in the South of the Caucasus because of the desert environment in Mesopotamia and the Iranian plateau. So not only wagons but Indo-European languages entered th4 Steppe through the Caucasus from the SOUTH
Very good easy to understand info
Very informative. Information dense. Somethings i didn't know. Thank you.
Keep it up man. You're killin' it!
Thanks bro, you've been encouraging me since the very start and I really appreciate it.
Thanks for making these videos!!
Thanks for watching.
I just stumbled across your channel, and I want you to know this is very much my jam. And I am very interested in picking up some of your books now
Thank you, glad you found us. I hope you enjoy the stories.
Another great video! Bravo!!
Nice video again, I have read Anthony's book a view times, personally I was never convinced about the lasting influence of the Maykop culture. The oldest wheels (physical, tracks, depictions) are still coming from Western Europe as he also explains in his book. It feels to me like a attempt of archeologists to explain that 'culture' came from Mesopotamia, a narrative that takes a long time to get adjusted.
Thank you. Yeah I think the splendid art and wealth of material culture from Mesopotamia has often blinded people to technological innovations in wood and leather than don't survive and in cultural innovations that don't show much or at all in the archeological record - like horse riding or the koryos. One issue is accuracy in dating. The TRB wheel tracks and plough marks are roughly contemporaneous with evidence for wheels and the plough in the near east, or at least they are all within the margins of error for the dating so it's impossible to prove the place of invention. Wherever it was it spread very quickly.
There is much disagreement about the importance of the Maikop. Some archeologists point out that it's the shiny stuff in the chief's graves that makes us believe they were significant but the people as a whole continued to live small and insignificant lives that didn't have much influence. But there is Maikop pottery and other material culture found in some steppe settlements, suggesting ongoing trade across the sea shores and up the great rivers. In Mikhailovka I on the Dnieper there may have been a Maikop population facilitating trade. And on the Don there is a suggestion of a small Maikop colony, again like a trading outpost. They did form a link of some kind between Mesopotamia and the steppe peoples.
Earliest wheel chariot found in sumer lol not western europe. Horses were domesticated in botai culture or probably iran not western europe.
@@karlmarx1730 unfortunately the archaeological evidence completely disagrees with what you are suggesting
@@Laotzu.Goldbug earliest wheel chariot is still found to be originally Sumerian. Although after some reconsideration about the Botai like a month or two months earlier, horses were found to be domesticated in EASTERN Europe and my comment was about 6 months ago so I gladly accept the new evidences.
Now if you have anything that disapproves the first one, do send.
@@Laotzu.Goldbug Not only does the archeological evidence disagree with the Botai culture domesticating horses but the Genetic and Isotope evidence also disagrees with the premise of the Botai ever Domesticating the horse. There is evidence that they hunted and consumed horse meat. But there is much clear Isotope evidence present in Yamnaya teeth that they were consuming horse raw milk which means they were probably also herding the horses.
Great work here Dan. Your style is so relatable and respectful, and, very importantly, not pushing a particular theory or conclusive analysis when the evidence just isn't in. First saw your vids about a fortnight ago and I'm hooked on you man. Haven't ever seen your books second-hand in my travels but I'll keep an eye out for your name as I think I'd absolutely love them.
Question: Were horses known to have been used by any other peoples or cultures before this time period where they seem so integral already to the Maikop?
Also, with the peoples of Mesopotamia and wider environs embroiled in cultural and factional spats for a long time previous to the Maikop period, why do you think there wasn't more migration by the southern cultures north and west to greener pastures, say, to beyond the Carpathians? ie. not too far via the water highway? Do you think these areas were defended against migrations somehow? Or that it well could have occurred in a trickle fashion? Or otherwise? Would love to hear your thoughts?
Thanks so much for the time and effort you put into these great productions.
Cheers mate
Michael Barrett
Thank you Michael, I appreciate it.
The exact time and place of horse domestication is unknown. It may have been by the Sredny Stog culture which was on the western end of the steppe around the Dnieper.
Do you mean why didn't mesopotamians migrate into the steppe and eastern Europe? They had no need to, their own homeland was the place their culture was adapted to, and they had no ability to, they could only really survive where they were by managing the water to grow crops. The later migrations by steppe people were facilitated by their already-mobile culture and the geography and climate of Europe.
About the Carpathian mountains culture you should check the Cucuteni Trypillian culture, much older than the Caucasian one. It's even considerate posibil to be disappeared spreading around the Black sea. In this particularly case Wikipedia seems to cover pretty well the subject.
Dan I’m reading your free book and I like it. Appreciate your videos and haven’t yet read your other works but what’s missing is an almanac or glossary of the first cultures…the yamnaya, cucuteni, terremare. The world to our consciousness begins with the crescent cultures, Akkadians, Babylonians etc. and rest seem to have very little on them.
Yes Mr.Radu the Crescent is the origin for the european civilization dont forget the Qhin region,Indus civilization and the regions in Mesoamerica.
Very good videos, it really sends you back in time. I can imagine these people. Please make a video about proto uralic/ugric people. There's no good quality videos on the topic.
Thank you, I appreciate that. I would like to make videos about them but I haven't really done much research there yet. One day I will.
Great content!
Love this thank u 🙏
Thank you for watching.
This is awesome, I just watched a history of Georgia which has some overlap with this ancient civilization.
BTW maykop were created by people who went there from today's Georgia's territory(Imereti region). you can search that. This sphere is so new we get more information every year.
thanks for this vid, id never heard of the Maykop
valuable document.
Great content and presentation mate. Subscribed
Thank you, welcome to the channel.
Thankyou for yet another great video about a lesser known ancient culture. You're doing a great job not letting this information and their history get forgotten. 👏 🤩
Love your work! Great video! New subscriber here, from small town southern Alberta 🤗❤
Thank you, welcome to the channel.
well done; all vids
According to Google Maps, you don't want to walk from Babylon to Maikop. You hike up to Trebizond, then hop on a ship to cross the Black Sea. Thanks, Trebizond!
Fascinating, maybe the Unetice culture in Central Europe is a successor of the Maykop or Southern Yamnaya people. Have you mentioned them before? They seem to be mainly responsible for bringing the R1b haplogroup to Central and Western Europe. The Unetice culture had excellent metal skills (Nebra sky disk) and is suspected to be the forerunner of the Celtic, Italic and Germanic languages.
"The archeological and genetic evidence (distribution of R1b subclades) point at several consecutive waves towards eastern and central Germany between 2800 BCE and 2300 BCE. The Unetice culture was probably the first culture in which R1b-L11 lineages played a major role. It is interesting to note that the Unetice period happen to correspond to the end of the Maykop (2500 BCE) and Kemi Oba (2200 BCE) cultures on the northern shores of the Black Sea, and their replacement by cultures descended from the northern steppes. It can therefore be envisaged that the (mostly) R1b population from the northern half of the Black Sea migrated westward due to pressure from other Indo-European people (R1a) from the north, for example that of the burgeoning Proto-Indo-Iranian branch, linked to the contemporary Poltavka and Abashevo cultures."
www.eupedia.com/europe/Haplogroup_R1b_Y-DNA.shtml
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unetice_culture
Yeah it's a fascinating and enormously complex period. I haven't got anywhere near to the Unetice period yet and won't for quite some time but we'll get there eventually. Cheers.
The Black Sea flooded and civilisations from around the lake moved.Oldest european civilisation its Hamangia on the Black Sea in Romania and Bulgaria with the famous sculpture ,,the thinker,,.
More rwlics can be found on the Black Sea bottom as it its anoxic at depth and even wood stays preserved like new.