1,600-year-old burials in Crimea hold gold and silver jewelry from 'rich women'

Archaeologists have unearthed gold and silver jewelry at an early-medieval burial ground near the city of Sevastopol in Crimea.

The new finds indicate that the burial ground — the Almalyk-dere necropolis on the Mangup plateau, about 10 miles (16 kilometers) east of Sevastopol — was for elite members of a society that spread across southwestern Crimea from the late fourth century until the sixth century.

Archaeologists first excavated parts of the Mangup plateau in the 19th century, and it has been systematically investigated since the 20th century. "As usual, this burial ground brought surprises," Valery Naumenko, an archaeologist at V.I. Vernadsky Crimean Federal University, said in a translated statement. "Despite the severe robbery of these complexes, there are things that are of independent scientific interest."

According to the statement, Naumenko and his colleagues are excavating the site along with archaeologists from the Russian Academy of Sciences. (Russia annexed Crimea from Ukraine in 2014, but Ukraine contends that the territory still belongs to them.)

The sixth-century Byzantine historian Procopius of Caesarea wrote that the Mangup region at that time was part of the Christian principality of Gothia, which had been established in southwestern Crimea by Goths who had refused to follow Theodoric the Great during his invasion of Italy in 488.

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Elite jewelry

The new finds are from two crypts dating from between the fourth and sixth centuries, and the jewelry seems to have been worn by women, according to the statement. The stash included fibulas (brooches), gold earrings, pieces of belts and shoe buckles, and appliqué jewelry made from gold foil that would have been sewn on the collars of garments.

The researchers said these artifacts were evidence of aristocratic burials at the site.

"Most likely, rich women were buried in both crypts where the items were found," Artur Nabokov, an archaeologist at the Institute of Archaeology of Crimea at the Russian Academy of Sciences, said in the statement, adding that the earrings were probably imported, while the fibulas were made in Crimea.

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The earrings are especially ornate and are made from gold with inlays of red semiprecious stones, either garnet or carnelian; while one pair of the fibulas was cast in silver and then covered with gold leaf and inlays of the red stone.

One of the crypts also held a decorated "pyxis" — a container that was made from an animal horn and was used to store cosmetic powders, like blush, the statement said.

The craggy Mangup plateau is dominated by the Mangup Kale fortress, the earliest parts of which date to the sixth century, although it was still in use in the 15th century; and there is archaeological evidence of prehistoric settlements there going back 5,000 years.

The researchers on the latest expedition to the area also explored a Christian "cave monastery" from the 15th century and a Muslim burial ground that was used between the 16th and 19th centuries, after the Ottoman Turks had seized control of the area, according to the statement.