Burial Rite of the Shchukinsky Burial Ground of the Lomovatovo Archaeological Culture

The Shchukino burial ground is located 300 m west of the village of Shchukino, Afanasyevsky district, Kirov region, on a small cape 14 m high on the right bank of the river. Kama. The site was discovered and studied by V.A. Kananin in 1977. A total of 82 burials were studied. The Shchukino burial ground is of interest due to the variety of types of burial rites. At the site, the burials were made according to the rite of cremation and inhumation. There are grave pits without structural features and there are pits with niches, shoulders and ledges. Shoulders and ledges are recorded in burials of the 9th century. In some of them, fragments of wooden flooring have been preserved; probably, the buried person was laid on the floor and covered with earth from above. Based on the analysis of grave goods, the author of the article singled out 5 chronological groups. The presence on the monument of two burials of the 6th century was refuted. Early materials are represented only by belt buckles. The dating of the burial ground should be narrowed down and the time of its functioning of the 7th –9th centuries should be indicated. Late burials survived in the greatest number (the monument was destroyed by natural factors). The author of the article made an assumption that two different cultural traditions existed in the region at the same time based on the clarification of the dating of the monument and the allocation of chronological groups. The burial rite of the Shchukino burial ground is similar to the rite at Averiny II, Agafonova I and II. The burial rite of the Shchukino burial ground differs in a number of ways (the design of the pits, the method of burial, filling the layer of pits, etc.) from the synchronous burial grounds of the Upper Kama region – Pleso, Demenkovsky, Kaneva, Urya.