Abstract
The article is based on toponymic data from the territories of spreading of the Belogorsk archaeological culture (a local variant of the Ananyino cultural-historical community). A number of assumptions regarding the ethno-linguistic affi liation of its representatives are put forward. In the absence of the Perm-language toponymy in these territories, the Permlanguage of Belogorsk tribal culture is questioned, while same toponymy is reliably traced via the microtoponymy in the adjacent areas, in areals of other variants of the Ananyino culturalhistorical community. This fact is especially notable because of the more ancient Indo-Iranian toponymic layer is traced in the same territories. Alternatively, as a working hypothesis, taking into account the data of toponymy, archeology and ethnic history of the region, the author puts forward the version about the possible Iranian language of representatives of the Belogorsk archaeological culture. To support this conclusion, the anthropology data certify to the representatives of the Belogorsk culture are physically much closer to the representatives of the southern steppe cultures, who probably were the Iranian nomads, rather than to holders of other variants of the Ananyino cultural-historical community during this period. Taking into account probable heterogeneity of carriers of the Ananyino cultural and historical community in the language relation, it is also impossible to exclude that representatives of the Belogorsk archaeological culture could speak some Finno-Ugric language closed to Volga-Finnish. In this case, the toponymic layer left by them could merge with the latest Mordvinian toponymy in this region.
Keywords
Belogorsk archaeological culture, toponymics, ethnolinguistic identity
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