Pages: 279-300 | DOI: https://doi.org/10.55086/sp264279300

The article is devoted to finds belonging to the early series of derivatives of strongly profiled brooches (Almgren type IV.68), known in the literature as “Oka brooches with a knob on the foot”. Their characteristic feature is a special opening in the head-plate for the spring chord. The catalogue includes 38 finds from 31 sites. They come from sites in the forest and forest-steppe zones of the Dnieper–Don interfluve. Similar derivatives are known among the antiquities of the eastern zone of the Przeworsk culture (the Topornica variant according to J. Andrzejowski). Another related phenomenon is represented by Vojtenki-type fibulae, as defined by M. E. Levada.
The emergence of the early series of Oka brooches with a knob on the foot is associated with eastern Zarubintsy groups and dates approximately to the second half of the 2nd century AD. Their presence in a number of hoards of objects made in the East European champlevé tradition indicates that they continued in use until the mid-3 rd century, when they came into the possession of the bearers of the Moshchino culture then forming in the Upper Oka region, within which their further evolution continued. A later, Moshchino series subsequently appeared and developed until the first half of the 5th century. Its analysis lies beyond the scope of the present article.

Keywords: forest and forest-steppe zones of the Dnieper-Don interfluve, the second half of the 2nd–3rd century, derivative from the strongly profiled brooches, Moshchino culture, a horizon of items made in the East European champlevé tradition

Information about author:

Alexey Vorontsov (Tula, Russian Federation). Candidate of Historical Sciences. Institute of Archaeology of the Russian Academy of Sciences. Dmitry Ulyanov St., 19, Moscow, 117292, Russian Federation
E-mail: [email protected]
ORCID: 0009-0000-8434-4051