Tamgas From the Steppe & From Other Places

An interesting aspect of Central European culture consists of the various “tamga” signs that are found on, as shown previously here, on spears. These have been interpreted as “runes” and, variously, as either Sarmatian or, for those who see Goths everywhere, as Gothic.

But such signs do not appear solely on spears. I decided to put together as complete a list of them as possible given the academic literature on the subject. We are not going, for the most part, to regurgitate the runes associated with the spear finds but rather concentrate on where else such symbols have been found. With that in mind, let’s start.

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Here are some tamgas from Alfred Götze‘s article (II. Mitteilungen – Ostgotische Helme und symbolische Zeichen) in the first issue of Mannus the Zeitschrift für Vorgeschichte (page 122).

This is what Götze says about these.

• on the left we have a buckle from the region of Kerch (Eastern Crimea)
• in the middle we have markings from the “rune spears” from Müncheberg and Kovel (this is the same as the spear of Soshychne or Sushichno or Suszyczno)
• then on the right we have “South Russian” markings

Then we have this Bosporan “gravestone” that Götze places in his article as Table XIX.

Some of these were then reproduced by Gustaf Kossinna in his pompously titled Die Deutsche Vorgeschichte – Eine Hervorragend Nationale Wissenschaft (German Prehistory: A Pre-Eminently National Discipline). It was dedicated “To the German people, as a building block in the reconstruction of the externally as well as internally disintegrated fatherland.” (Kossina who was a Pole by descent was the turn of the century’s greatest case of the Clayton Bigsby Syndrome – his attempts at explaining his patently Suavic last name are truly painful to read but recommended for anyone interested in identity issues). In any event, these copies from Mannus are found on pages 193 and as Table XXXVII before page 194.

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These come from Tadeusz Sulimirski‘s 1964 article “Sarmatians in the Polish Past” (in the “Polish Review”).

And this is a similar table, previously posted on this site, that Sulimirski included in his 1970 book “The Sarmatians”.

In the “Sarmatians in the Polish Past” article Sulimirski also compares these to the symbols that frequent the Polish heraldic tradition.

“The Sarmatians” also featured a similar table.You will recognize some of these from the spears pictures put up on this site. But how about the others?

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Another interesting article that reveals some of these is Włodzimierz Antoniewicz’s Żelazne oszczepy inkrustowane z Kamienicy, w pow. jarosławskim. In addition to some spear pics he also includes these.

This is from Zazdrist/За́здрість (Polish Zazdrość) in Western Ukraine. You can also see it in Sulimirski’s table above.

This is a lion from ancient Olbia on the Black Sea.

These Antoniewicz labels markings from a Kerch catacomb.

And here are some symbols he puts together.

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This compilation, in turn, comes from Vitalie Bârcă‘s article “A Few Notes on the Tamgas From the Golden Plaque in the Sarmatian Grave at Dunaharaszti (Hungary).” The specific table here is a compilation of tables (2-4) from a 2012 article by Sergey Yatsenko and Halina Dobrzańska “Germanic Parade Speers of the 2nd-3rd century A.D. with Sarmatian Markings” (Парадные германские копья II-III вв. н.э. с сарматскими знаками). The assumption that these are Germanic or Gothic is rather dubious. If they have Sarmatian signs then they should be labeled as Sarmatian, end of story.He also shows these from Sergey Yatsenko‘s 2001 book “Tamga sings of Iranian-speaking peoples of antiquity and the Middle Ages” (Знаки-тамги ираноязычных народов древности и раннего средне-вековья) at the end of which the author features perhaps the most comprehensive set of illustrations of tamga signs from Mongolia to Europe.

For more of the same you can take a look at these symbols from a 2017 book “Sarmatians. History and Archaeology of a Forgotten People” by Eszter Istvánovits and Valéria Kulcsár (in Monographien des Römisch-Germanischen Zentralmuseums – Band 123). This is the most comprehensive book on the Sarmatians since Sulimirski’s.

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It behooves also to notice the publications by the Ukrainian researcher Karol Bołsunowski regarding the so-called Drohiczyn lead signs from Drohiczyn, Poland. These were first published over a number of years at the end of the 19th century, then collected in the anthropological journal Światowit and then published as a self-standing booklet in 1903 in Znaki symboliczne na ołowiu (plomby): ich znaczenie i klasyfikacja. Here is just a small sample from that publication.

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Bring this back to Central Europe, the so-called mushroom stone sculpture at Sobótka in Silesia near mount Ślęża features some tamgas at its base.

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Finally, there is this. This hammer comes from Cisek near Kędzierzyn-Koźle and is attributed to the “pre-Lusatian” culture. The detail on the left resembles the etchings on the spears from Jankowo, Podlodów or Münchenberg-Dahmsdorf and the detail on the right resembles the etchings from various spears. This is what we have been calling the “2” sign as, for example we’ve shown here.

Here you can see the right side symbol better (compare this as well as the “Sun” symbol with the Gotland Sand church stone picture below).

This sign is similar to the horses heads that frequent the tops of peasant houses from Germany to Lithuania. In Poland these go by the name śparogi or śwarogi (note that a reconstructed *spar has a meaning that is related to svar in, apparently, Sogdian – that is meaning “to glitter, to shine, to bloom”) and are particular frequent on houses in the Kuyavia and Podlasie regions. The following is from Jan Sas Zubrzycki’s “The Polish Carpenter” (Cieśla Polski).

Here is a similar motif from Lithuania – perhaps the Lithuanian Horse Twins: the Ašvieniai.And here is the same motif from the Oseberg tapestry (which, BTW, as with the rest of the Oseberg finds features a swastika). Here the heads are looking inwards.

And some others from the Viking era both closed and open.

Then this Polish version.

This sign is also similar to components of the omega letter. See below for more on that notion.

And here is a version from the Vernand treasure:

And another of some type of an animal that is not a horse (dragon or duck with similar beaks to the Polish version above):

Here are some brooches with the same animal motif of the Jutland style:

Another example are these feathers, snakes, dragons, horses or just ornaments found in the crowns of Osiris and Isis. Horus on the left has a different crown, though, like Osiris with a phallic-like element – compare that with Isis’ egg-like element:

Interestingly, that sign looks like omega when “facing” a similar symmetrical reflection of itself. Sometimes we see both of these versions facing (or rotated) away from each other. At other times facing away from each other while rotated about the base of one of the symbols. Here is an image that makes the connection rather explicit. This is from Ołbin in Wrocław (also, interestingly, it’s part of a depiction of, among others, Jaxa of Köpenick):

Here is another interesting piece of art from Rybakov:

An even more interesting Rybakov picture is this which shows dragons or snakes or horses facing different ways, very similar to the above variations of the “2” and clearly connected with celestial bodies (see below for an example from Gotland):

And take a look at these belts from Caerwent, Wales (the first was already discussed here in the context of rosettes):

 

Finally, something from Gotland (see this website for more):

Or take a look at this cauldron from Sulimirski’s “The Sarmatians” (in a Moscow museum).

Finally, take a look at these bracelets found in a barrow at Ivanye an dated to the 2nd millenium BC. Ivanye is in the Rivne oblast first noted by Sveshnikov in 1968. It is not clear whether this is identical with Ivanychi but, if so, then this is less than 100 miles from Soshychne where the Kovel spear – dated to a much later time (one and a half to two thousand years later) – was found. The same sign – if I can call it that – is present on that spear.

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