Features of the cult of ancestors in the Northern Black Sea region of the late classical time(based on the materials of the settlement “Belinskoye”)

The main purpose of the study is to determine the religious essence of the ritual actions performed at the settlement Belinskoye, located on the western borders of the Bosporan Kingdom. The rite has been performed in a special pit in the ashy sanctuary and dates back to the late Classical time. Using a comparative typological method of research, the authors concluded that a ceremony of glorification of a deceased person was held here, who was buried, most likely, somewhere near the sanctuary or on the necropolis. The fact that this rite was performed not on the grave of the deceased, but on the old ash pit between the necropolis and residential buildings, testifies to the preservation of the ancient Scythian tradition by the population of the settlement. The features of the ritual pit are sufficiently specific, since, apparently, they reflect a kind of regional transformation of religious beliefs in a complex border region, as a result of the influence of ancient and barbaric cultures in the era of the crisis of ancient civilization and Bosporan statehood.