214 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS VOL. 1 10 



to Australian crania or lArkho's "South Siberian" type is not repre- 

 sented among modern European races; the Lower Volga series in 

 this respect may be compared only with the Upper Paleolithic series 

 from Briinn (Brno) and Predmost in Moravia. 



The "Catacomb Burial Period," succeeding the Drevne-IAmnaia 

 culture, is characterized by a greater increase in animal domestica- 

 tion. These burials, almost never found on the left bank of the Volga, 

 are probably a local form. Only four male crania of this period, from 

 the Ust-Griaznukha excavations of T. Minaeva near Stalingrad, 

 were studied. In general, they have both a greater cranial index and 

 a greater height than the crania of the preceding period associated 

 with a European facial structure. 



Debets mentions that another more numerous group of brachy- 

 cephalic crania from catacomb burials is known from the Slobodka- 

 Romanovka tumulus near Odessa, described in 191 5 by D. K. Tretia- 

 kov, who states that "catacomb-building brachycephals are found as 

 an alien element wedged among the predominantly dolichcephalic 

 populations." 



The second half of the Bronze Age in the Lower Volga area is 

 known as "Srubno-Khvalynskaia " ^ after P. S. Rykov and V. V. 

 Holmsten, or "Stage II of gens-society" after A. P. Kruglov and 

 G. V. Podgaetskii. This culture is characterized by the leading role 

 of agriculture and the use of domesticated animals. 



The skeletal remains differ but slightly from those of the preceding 

 period. The crania are characterized by straighter foreheads, smaller 

 browridges, and a somewhat smaller bizygomatic breadth. There was 

 no apparent connection between the slight change in morphological 

 characters and local cultural variations so that there was no reason 

 for supposing that the people of the Srubno-Khvalynskaia culture 

 came from outside. 



Only one female skull from the subsequent period, the so-called 

 Scythian stage, was available to Debets. This in turn was followed 

 by the Sarmatian culture (third century B. C. — third century A. D.). 



Skeletal remains from 17 sites, excavated by Zhuravlev (i), P. D. 

 Rau (11), and P. S. Rykov (5), were studied by Debets. In 1928 

 B. Grekov pointed out the similarity between the Volga and the Ural 

 burials of the Hellenistic period. The later burials, attributed to the 

 Roman period, are connected with the preceding phase by a series of 

 minor transitions so that burials from both periods can be considered 

 as belonging to one "Sarmatian" culture, characterized by pastoral 

 nomadism. 



1 "Log-cabin type of burial culture." 



