Art for people on the move
Scythian art is known mostly from gold, bronze and bone objects that survive in graves. Much of it was made to be worn, carried or attached to horses, weapons and clothing, which suits a mobile way of life. The main style is called the animal style, in which animals are shown in stylised forms with strong curves and flowing outlines. It is an art of craft as much as of treasure, and it rewards attention to how the objects were made and used.
The animal style
Typical subjects of the animal style are stags, with antlers sweeping back along the body, big cats such as panthers and lions, eagles and other birds of prey, wild boar, elk, rams and horses. Fantastic creatures such as griffins appear, a motif also found in Greek and Near Eastern art. Animals are often shown curled up, twisted or in combat scenes, with body parts such as ears, hips and tail ending in smaller animal heads. This habit of turning one animal into another can make a single object into a visual puzzle.
The objects include plaques sewn onto clothing or shields, belt and harness fittings, vessel handles, weapon sheaths, and cheek pieces for bridles. Because they decorated riding gear and weapons, they connected the art to the horse and the hunt. Their meaning is debated. Some scholars see protection, status or clan markers, and others see mythology and cosmology, but there is no written key to the symbols, and certainty is not possible.
The origins of the style are also debated. Early forms appear in the east, in Tuva and the Altai, as at Arzhan, and in the west on the Pontic steppe. It is not clear that it spread in one direction. The style also interacted with Near Eastern and Persian art, including motifs that remind observers of Assyrian palace reliefs, where lions and hunting scenes had long been a royal subject, though influence is hard to prove object by object.
Techniques
Steppe craftsmen worked in several metals and techniques.
- Casting. Many bronze and some gold objects were made by lost-wax casting, in which a wax model is covered in clay, melted out and replaced with metal.
- Sheet gold and repoussé. Thin gold sheets were pressed or hammered over a carved form to create relief plaques.
- Inlay and filigree. Stones, glass, enamel or other metals could be set into bodies, and fine wire was soldered on as decoration.
- Other materials. In frozen Pazyryk tombs, leather and felt cut-outs show the same animal motifs, so the style was not limited to metal.
Kul-Oba and the Greek connection
The Kul-Oba kurgan near Kerch in Crimea, opened in 1830, contained a rich burial of the 4th century BCE. Its contents, now in the Hermitage Museum in St Petersburg, included gold plaques and ornaments, a heavy neck ring and an electrum vessel decorated with scenes of Scythian men. These show clothing, hair and gestures in detail and have been much used as evidence of how Scythians looked, though they are made by Greek artists for Scythian taste.
That point is key to understanding the Pontic hoards. Some of the most famous pieces, including the gold comb from Solokha with a battle scene and the pectoral from Tolstaya Mogila, discovered in 1971, show Greek craftsmanship applied to Scythian subjects. The Tolstaya Mogila pectoral includes animals and herders at work in a composition of crescent form. These are usually thought to be made in Greek workshops of the Bosporan region, perhaps for a local ruler. The comparison with Greek sculpture and pottery of the period shows the same sense of naturalism. Mixed objects like this are better called Graeco-Scythian than purely Scythian.
Gold from Tillya Tepe
Tillya Tepe, “Golden Hill”, in northern Afghanistan, was excavated in 1978 and 1979 by a Soviet-Afghan team led by Viktor Sarianidi. It contained six burials of people wearing large quantities of gold jewellery and clothing ornaments, sometimes reported as many thousands of pieces. The graves date from around the 1st century BCE to the 1st century CE, much later than the Scythian heartland.
The people buried there are not usually called Scythians in the narrow sense. They are generally treated as part of the wider world of steppe-related nomad elites, and scholars debate their identification. Some of their gold shows an animal style recalling earlier steppe art, while other pieces show Hellenistic, Central Asian and Indian influence. The case shows how the tradition continued and changed over centuries.
Craft traditions beyond the Scythians
Comparing animal-style art with other peoples helps place it. The Thracian gold treasures of the Balkans share a taste for gold vessels and horse ornament. The La Tene style of the Celts also uses flowing, curved forms and fusions of animal and plant, though it grew from different sources. Each tradition was linked by trade and contact, and none was an isolated invention. The case of the Persian court style, as in Persian imperial culture, is another neighbour, which influenced the arts of Scythians and was influenced in turn.
Reading the objects carefully
A few cautions apply to Scythian goldwork. Many objects come from old excavations in which context was poorly recorded. Looting and the art market have also affected collections, and not every piece sold as Scythian is genuine. Modern technical study, including microscopy and analysis of the metal, helps to separate workshops and to identify later restorations.
Above all, the objects should be understood in their own setting. They were status markers, burial gifts and fittings of horse and weapon, produced by skilled craftsmen for people who valued mobility and display.