«İRS- Наследие».-2008.-№6(36).-S.11-17.

Rock art of Gobustan

FIRUZE MURADOVA

Doctor of History

As is well known, Azerbaijan belongs to the regions of initial expansion and settling of people.

Historical and archeological monuments related to periods of human evolution, found in the territory the country, provide evidence of this. Azerbaijan, lich is called "the open air museum", has had the most favorable of natural and geographical conditions from the earliest times. World-renowned Gobustan is one of the beautiful sights of Azerbaijan, satiated with valuable monuments of the past. Gobustan is a geographical district in the southeast Azerbaijan. That extensive territory between the south-east spurs of the Greater Caucasus and the Caspian Sea, is crossed by ravines and dry valleys (qobugully, crease of cutoff). To the north Gobustan borders e southern continuation of the Main Caucasus Ridge, the west - the Valley of Pirsaatchay River, in the south the mountains of Mishovdag and Kharami and in the east - the coast of the Caspian Sea and the Absheron peninsula. Its extent from the north to the south is 100 km; from the west to the east is 80 km. The largest of the Caucasus mud volcanoes are located there. The climate is arid subtropical with relatively gentle winters and hot summers. The principal river is Jeyrankechmez. On the mountain Boyukdash there are springs and wells fed from groundwater of limestone sediments and atmospheric precipitation. The flora revives after short-term spring and summer rains. However a few millennia ago Gobustan's nature was definitely more favorable for human habitation - the various rock depictions of animals and the results of archaeological research testify to this. In the Stone Age wild horse, jeyran, primitive bull, ibex and wild boar were widespread in these places. The territory of Gobustan was covered with dense growth of savanna type, and possibly with wooded areas. The mountain ranges of Boyukdash and Kichikdash and the close vicinity to the Caspian shore were favorable to the settling of ancient people. In the Stone Age ancient people used the flat heights of above-mentioned massifs for rotational hunting, and in the Bronze Age - as natural fortifications. As a result of the listed circumstances the territory of Gobustan is rich in rock art, sites of primitive man and other monuments of the distant past.

The ancient rock art of Gobustan became known to science in 1939-1940 due to the research of I.M. Jafarzade. The systematic research of the petroglyphs of Gobustan started in 1947. On the mountains of Kichikdash, Boyukdash and Jingirdakh 3500 pieces of rock art on 750 rocks were discovered. Starting in 1965, a special scientific expedition was engaged in the study of the monuments of Gobustan, led by J. Rustamov and F. Muradova. The expedition conducted archaeological research into more than 20 dwellings and shelters, more than 40 burials and discovered and registered approximately 300 new rock art sites. Currently the number of known rock art sites reaches six thousand. Judging from the materials accumulated to the present day, the appearance of rock and stone art in Gobustan date to the vast period of time from 18-15th millennia B.C. up to the Dark Ages, and during that time, life there continued uninterrupted, excepting short-term breaks in the use of some primitive sites as a result of natural disasters.

The monuments of Gobustan are divided into two groups: 1) rock art and 2) ancient sites and other objects.

According to new investigations, the natural habitat of the rock art spread is wider than was previously supposed: monuments of Shongara, Shikhgaya, and Shikhova have been added to the art of Boyukdash, Kichikdash, Dzhingirdag, and Yazlytepe.

The rock art of Gobustan embodies people, animals, celestial bodies, birds, fishes, fishing and hunting networks, snakes and lizards, scorpions, different signs and characters, and also remains of inscriptions in Arabic and Latin scripts. The magnitude of the historical time span covered by this rock art, the variety of their subjects, the reflection of life, the realism, and the use of different technical mefhods make Gobustan an unique historical and archeological complex and a museum in the open air, the exhibits of which are kept in their original locations.

Images of people and animals and also stages of life in which they participated are the main subjects of the rock art of Gobustan. The most ancient images of people belong to the Paleolithic era and were knocked out like a bas-relief - a technique which is characteristic for the rock art of Gobustan. On female images breasts and hips are emphasized as symbols of maternity. Many researchers consider female images and figurines to serve as symbols of fertility. In our opinion, female images in Gobustan personify fertility and testify to the cult of woman. Some female figures are depicted with bow and arrows, others are decorated or dressed.

Masculine figures in Gobustan are broad-shouldered, with thick bodies and emphasized calf muscles and shoulders, with a bandage on a belt, in many cases with bow and arrows on one shoulder. Some have a weapon reminiscent of a boomerang. The bandage on a belt allows knowledge of the climate and clothes of those times. On the whole, the images of Gobustan depict people distinguished in hunt or labor, and also leaders and elders of tribes.

Among the images of animal which make up the majority of depictions in the rock art you can find bulls, gazelles, horses, deer, wild boars, lions, tigers, wolves, foxes, dogs, cats, fish, birds, lizards, tortoises, scorpions and others. Animal images are more realistic. Images of bulls, goats, and deer served as totems in different times. There are also colored images in Gobustan.

Ancient artists very skillfully depicted their tribesmen, animals which served as the objects of hunts or totems, in general all that took place around them, and thereby left a most valuable record for subsequent generations. On the massifs of Kichikdash and Boyukdash the paintings of boats are widespread. All these images were made with pieces of river pebble or flint. It is assumed that the ancient Azerbaijani dance Yally, an image of which can be seen on one of the rock carvings of Gobustan, arose exactly in these places and was performed with the accompaniment of the playing of the gavaldash.

The closeness to the Caspian Sea stipulated an important role for fishing in the life of the ancient inhabitants of Gobustan. These places once served as habitat of kaspies - skilful shipbuilders, sea-folk and fishermen. Judging from historical materials, these tribes belong among the most ancient of the people of the Caucasus. They made the boats mainly from reed.

Incidentally, Thor Heyerdahl, who first visited Gobustan in 1981, conducted analogies between the boats Ra and Tigris and the ancient boats of Gobustan. Having familiarized himself with the materials of the archaeological research in Gobustan, he remarked that local rock depictions of boats were the most ancient in the world; therefore Azerbaijan is the motherland of navigation.

During investigations in Gobustan the sites Hunting Grotto, 4th Under-stone Asylum, Main Grotto, Kyaniza, Bulls, Bulls-2, Deer, Under-stone, Firuz, Firuz-2, Shongar, Chapmaly, two burial places of Stone Age, dwellings of Bronze Age of Boyukdash, the Circle, the medieval temple and more than 40 burial mounds were studied. On the basis of materials found in excavations valuable information has been discovered about the economic life, way of life, material culture, art, spiritual world and beliefs of Gobustans inhabitants in different historical periods. Most tools are made from pebble and flint; the latest ones are of Microlithic character. Arrow heads, needles and instruments for making of nets were made from bones.

Decorations made from pebbles, cockleshells and teeth of different animals can be found. The wealth of this cultural layer testifies to the settled way of life of the population of Gobustan in the Stone Age.

Small ornamental stones and pictures on the walls of sites, covered with a cultural layer, discovered during archaeological excavations from the layers of different ages are very important for working out different historical and archaeological problems, including specification of the Mesolithic and late Stone Age in Azerbaijan.

At the late Mesolithic settlement site of Firuz, a grave with remains of eleven persons who were close to modern Azerbaijanis in anthropological type have been discovered. These, and also the scenes with ethnographic context on some of the rock art, including the abduction of a girl, allow the conclusion that the ancient inhabitants of Gobustan are the ancestors of Azerbaijanis to be reached.

In 1966 Gobustan was declared a historic-artistic reserve, and in 2007 it was included in the World Heritage List of UNESCO. It is our duty to preserve this unique sight of our Motherland, in which its distant past has been preserved, and pass it on to our descendants.