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Timeline • Origins • Etymology
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The Kura-Araxes culture or the Early trans-Caucasian culture, a civilization that existed from 3400 B.C until about 2000 B.C. The earliest evidence for this culture is found on the Ararat plain and in Nakhichevan; thence it spread to Georgia by 3000 B.C., and during the next millennium it proceeded westward to the Erzurum plain, southwest to Cilicia, and to the southeast into an area below the Urmia basin and Lake Van, down to the borders of present day Syria. Altogether, the early Trans-Caucasian culture, at its greatest spread, enveloped a vast area approximately 1000 km by 500 km.

The name of this culture (given by modern archaeologists) comes from the Kura and Araxes river valleys where they developed. The territory they inhabited are generally thought to be present day Armenia, Georgia and Azerbaijan. It may have given rise to the later Khirbet Kerak ware culture found in Syria and Canaan during the mid-third millennium BC.

The earliest record identified with Armenians, is from an inscription which mentions Armani, Արման (most common Armenians names Arman, the older variant of Armen, Արմեն) together with Ibla, as territories conquered by Naram-Sin (2300 BC) identified with an Akkadian colony in the Diarbekr region. To this day the Assyrians refer to Armenians by this form Armani. Another mention by Thutmose III of Egypt, mentions the people of Ermenen in 1446 BC, and says in their land "heaven rests upon its four pillars". (Thutmose was the first Pharoah to cross the Euphrates to reach the Armenian Highlands). To this day Kurds and Turks refer to Armenians by Ermeni.

History

In its earliest phase, metal was scant, but it would later display "a precocious metallurgical development which strongly influenced surrounding regions" JP Mallory, EIEC, pp. 341-42.

They built mud-brick houses, originally round, but later developing into a square design. The economy was based on farming and livestock-raising. They grew grain and various orchard crops, and are known to have used implements to make flour. They raised cattle, sheep, goats, dogs, and in its later phases, horses.

Their pottery was distinctive. It was painted black and red, using geometric designs for ornamentation. Examples have been found as far south as Syria and Israel, and as far north as Dagestan and Chechnya. The spread of this pottery, along with archaeological evidence of invasions, suggests that the Kura-Araxes people may have spread outward from their original homes, and most certainly, had extensive trade contacts.

Their metal goods were widely distributed, recorded in the Volga, Dnieper and Don-Donets systems in the north, into Syria and Palestine in the south, and west into Anatolia. The culture is closely linked to the approximately contemporaneous Maykop culture of Transcaucasia. They are also remarkable for the production of wheeled vehicles (wagons and carts).

Inhumation practices are mixed. Flat graves are found, but so are substantial kurgan burials, the latter of which may be surrounded by cromlechs. This points to a heterogeneous ethno-linguistic population. Hurrian and Urartian elements are quite probable. One can also argue for at least an outpost of an early Semitic language, and certainly the presence of an early representative of the Kartvelian languages is not unreasonable. An influence of Indo-European languages was also likely present.

In certain theories for locating the Urheimat (homeland) of the Proto-Indo-European language, this culture (and perhaps that of the Maykop culture) is identified with the speakers of the Anatolian languages, and even as an earlier Urheimat. Scholars Tamaz Gamkrelidze and Vyacheslav Vsevolodovich Ivanov attempt to place this Urheimat in Armenia. Professor Lord Renfrew's hypothesis of an Anatolian homeland has less support, but the idea of locating the Anatolian-speakers in the Caucasus, with the remainder of the Indo-European stock having descended into the Ponto-Caspian steppe to a secondary Urheimat sometime before 4000 BC is not without supporters.

References

1. The early Trans-Caucasian culture - I.M. Diakonoff, 1984
2. The Hurro-Urartian people - John A.C. Greppin
3. Encyclopedic Dictionary of Archaeology - Page 246 by Barbara Ann Kipfer
4. International Standard Bible Encyclopedia, 1915; Eric H. Cline and David O'Connor (eds.) Thutmose III, University of Michigan, 2006, ISBN 978-0472114672.
5. “Armenians” in Encyclopedia of Indo-European Culture or EIEC, edited by James P. Mallory and Douglas Q. Adams, published in 1997 by Fitzroy Dearborn.

See also

• Aratta
• Mitanni
• Rudna Glava
• Bronze
• Prehistoric Armenia
• Prehistoric Georgia

External links

• The Chronology of the Caucasus During the Early Metal Age: Observations from Central Transcaucasus - Giorgi L. Kavtaradze
• The Beginnings of Metallurgy - includes extensive discussion of Kura-Araxes metalworking

Sources

• James P. Mallory, "Kuro-Araxes Culture", Encyclopedia of Indo-European Culture, Fitzroy Dearborn, 1997.

• Ancient peoples
• Archaeological cultures
• Archaeological sites in Georgia (country)
• Archaeological sites in Armenia
• Archaeological sites in Ossetia
• Archaeological sites in Chechnya
• Archaeological sites in Dagestan
• Archaeological sites in Azerbaijan
• Archaeological sites in Turkey
• Archaeological sites in Iran
• Archaeology of the Caucasus
• Bronze Age
• Copper Age
• EIEC
• Indo-European
• Stone Age