Center for Archaeological Anthropology

The basis of the Center's research work is the study of societies that are known to us entirely or largely based on archaeological data. The Center's work focuses on social, political, and cultural processes and institutions and their reconstruction based on archaeological materials combined with other types of sources.

The purpose of the Center's work is to develop an important and promising area of modern science – social archaeology. Meanwhile, social reconstructions in archaeology are a complex methodological and methodical task that has long been addressed by world science.

The center's work is focused on interdisciplinary research and involves close collaboration with colleagues from the Institute of Oriental Studies and other organizations specializing in such fields as archaeology, social anthropology, ancient world history, medieval studies, classical studies, and, of course, the involvement of specialists from the natural sciences – physical anthropologists, paleobotanists, paleogeneticists, physicists, soil scientists and other specialists.

The staff's attention is focused on an integrated approach to solving scientific problems based on the analysis and generalization of various types of sources – archaeological, narrative, as well as data from natural science disciplines. Special attention in the work of the Center is paid to the analysis of societies of the Early Iron Age and the Early Middle Ages, since for this time we have, in addition to archeology, a corpus of written sources (literary tradition and epigraphy). This makes it possible to reconstruct significantly more completely than according to data from earlier epochs (the Stone and Bronze Ages). 

It should be noted that the research objects of the Center's staff overlap to some extent with the research objects of other departments of the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences - for example, the archeology of the Crimea, the Caucasus, Central Asia and the steppe belt of the steppes of Eurasia. But the ultimate goal of research for the staff of the Center is primarily not to study material culture, but socio-cultural processes, social history, i.e. the reconstruction of historical societies in the theoretical framework of social anthropology.
The main tasks of the Center for Archaeological Anthropology of the Department of Anthropology of the Federal State Budgetary Educational Institution of the Russian Academy of Sciences are:

• A study of the social archaeology of the Early Nomads of Eurasia and Barbaricum;
  Research of the Barbaricum of Circumpontic region;
• Archaeological study of the socio-political organization of Eurasian societies of the Early Iron Age and the Middle Ages;
• Development and refinement of the conceptual framework, including social terminology, for social archaeology;
• Conducting comprehensive research (involving data from the written tradition, as well as data from natural sciences) for the reconstruction of ancient and medieval societies;
• The study of economics and household systems of ancient and medieval societies based on data from archaeology, ethnography and related natural sciences (palynology, archaeobotany, soil science et cetera);
• Analysis of the principles and forms of organization, the level of socio-cultural complexity and social dynamics of ancient and medieval societies in comparison with societies of comparable level of development, known ethnographically;
• Reconstruction of the systems of ideas and worldview of ancient and medieval societies;
• The development of the integration of science and education, the involvement of young scientists in scientific research through cooperation with universities.

To fulfill various research tasks, the Center for Archaeological Anthropology cooperates with other departments of the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences, as well as the Institute of Archeology of the Russian Academy of Sciences, the Institute of General History of the Russian Academy of Sciences, the Institute of the History of Material Culture of the Russian Academy of Sciences, the Institute of Ethnology and Anthropology of the Russian Academy of Sciences, the National Research University of Higher School of Economics, the Russian State University for the Humanities, museums and archaeological organizations.

In the future, it is planned to expand research within the framework of the scientific problems of the Center – chronological and geographical, as well as solving related tasks – organizing conferences and archaeological expeditions. 

Staff