Issyk kurgan: Difference between revisions

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The Issyk kurgan, in south-eastern Kazakhstan, less than 20 km east from the Talgar alluvial fan, near Issyk, was discovered in 1969. It is dated to the 4th or 3rd century BC (Hall 1997).

It contained a skeleton of uncertain sex, interred with warrior's equipment, variously dubbed "golden man" or "golden princess", and with rich funerary goods, including 4,000 gold ornaments. A notable item is a silver cup bearing an inscription.

The Issyk inscription is in a variant of the Kharoṣṭhī script, and is probably in a Scythian dialect, constituting one of very few autochthonous epigraphic traces of that language. Harmatta (1999) identifies the language as "Khotanese Saka", tentatively translating "The vessel should hold wine of grapes, added cooked food, so much so, to the mortal (man), then added cooked fresh butter on".

References

Hall, Mark E. Towards an absolute chronology for the Iron Age of Inner Asia. Antiquity 71 (1997): 863-874.
Harmatta, Janos. History of Civilization of Central Asia. Volume 2. Published 1999

Motilal Banarsidass Publisher. pg 421. [1]

External links

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 It contained a skeleton of uncertain sex, interred with warrior's equipment, variously dubbed "golden man" or "golden princess", and with rich funerary goods, including 4,000 gold ornaments. A notable item is a silver cup bearing an inscription.
-The Issyk inscription is is assumed to be in [[Scythian language|Scythian]], and would be the one of very few autochthonous epigraphic traces of that language. Prof. Janos Harmatta in the article ''language and literature in the Kushan Empire'' has shown that the text is in Khotanese Saka and gives the translation: ''The vessel should hold wine of grapes, added cooked food, so much so, to the mortal(man), then added cooked fresh butter on''
+The Issyk inscription is in a variant of the [[Kharoṣṭhī]] script, and is probably in a [[Scythian language|Scythian]] dialect, constituting one of very few autochthonous epigraphic traces of that language. Harmatta (1999) identifies the language as "Khotanese Saka", tentatively translating "The vessel should hold wine of grapes, added cooked food, so much so, to the mortal (man), then added cooked fresh butter on".
 ==References==