Фаунистические образы из материалов Усть-Войкарского городища

For the first time this study presents the collection of artifacts depicting various representatives of the fauna (zoomorphic, ornithomorphic, and ichthyomorphic), which were discovered at the Ust-Voikar settlement during excavations of 2012-2016. The collection offaunal representations from Ust-Voikar is one of the most representative collections known from the contemporaneous sites ofNorthwestern Siberia. A significant share of the images makes it possible to identify specific animal species. The artifacts were found both between and inside dwelling spaces. The locations offaunal figures in the dwellings corresponded to the areas traditionally associated with ritual functions in the worldview of the Ob Ugrians. Dendrochronological data indicate that allfinds belonged to the cultural layers from the early 16th to the first third of the 18th centuries, and were absent from later layers. It may be assumed that these figurines (or some of them) were associated with “substitute sacrifice” rituals. The discovery offaunal images at Ust-Voikar makes it possible to expand the practice of “substitute sacrifice” among the Northern Khanty, described by ethnographers for the 19th-21st centuries, back to the 16th-17th centuries. Absence of such figurines in the layers of the 18th century most likely resulted from mass Christianization of the indigenous population of Western Siberia, which was accompanied by search and destruction of cultic sites and ritual paraphernalia.