Odontoscopy of the tagar population series based on materials from Stantsiya Kazanovskaya-1 burial mound

The article considers odontologic research of the series materials from the burial mound Stantsiya Kazanovskaya-1. This burial mound is dated back to 8-6th centuries BC (Podgornovo stage of the Tagar culture) (Bogdanov et al., 2020). The series includes permanent teeth of 23 individuals (7 male, 11 females, 4 infants, and 1 individual whose sexual identity could not be determined). The examination was carried out according to the standard odontoscopy program (Zubov, 1968; 2006) with archaic markers recording (Zubova, 2013). As a result, it was concluded that the anthropological composition of the studied group is close to the characteristics of the eastern dental type (mongoloid). An increase in some mongoloid features and a decrease in molar gracilization frequencies (reduction of the hypocone of the upper second molars, four-cusp lower first and second molars) significantly distinguish the Tagar series from Stantsiya Kazanovskaya-1 from other Tagar groups that had been studied earlier (Postnikova, 1974; Rykushina, 1977; Gulevskaya, unpublished data). Moreover, an intergroup comparison was carried out using the method of principal component analysis. The comparative analysis included odontologic series of the Early Iron Age from the Southern and Western Siberia, Western and Central Kazakhstan, the Aral Sea region, and the Southern Urals. As a result, the group from the Stantsiya Kazanovskaya-1 burial mound demonstrated the closest similarity to the Bolsherechye population of the Novosibirsk Ob region, as well as some similarity was recorded to the populations of Sargat and Kamensk cultures, and, more distantly, with the Ural group of early Sarmatians from the Pokrovka X burial ground and the Ural savromats from the Kazy-Baba burial ground. Therefore, the conclusion was made on possible formation of the anthropological composition of the studied Tagar group on a local basis and on the priority direction of interaction with the synchronous West Siberian forest-steppe populations.