Keywords
ancient art, Paleo-Ainu culture, Ainu, Iturup Island, archaeological ceramics, cord ornament, composition, creation myth of the world,
How to Cite
Vasilevski A. A. Mythological plot of the creation of the world on ancient ceramics from Iturup Island // The Art of Eurasia, 2024. № 3 (34). P. 24–33. URL: https://doi.org/10.46748/ARTEURAS.2024.03.002.
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Abstract
The article presents a study of ancient art as a source of information about the culture of the Ainu people, who inhabited the Kuril Islands. The subject of the study is an ornamental composition on a ceramic vessel from Iturup Island of the Great Kuril Ridge, dated to the first half to the middle of the first millennium AD. The analysis of Ainu ceramics from the Paleometal Age has enabled the technique of decoration application. The stages of encoding the mythological plot about the creation of the Ainu world, Ainu-mosir(i), accompanied by the replacement of anthropomorphic symbols with geometric ones, have been traced for the first time. Therefore, the composition of multi-element ornamentation serves two purposes: firstly, as a means of decorating ceramic products and secondly, as a means of transmitting sacred information and a cultural code that is significant for the Ainu as a non-written people.
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