Felt in the funerary rite practiced in the Rusenikhino burial-ground

In this article felt rugs are published (figs 1, 1, 2; 2; 3, 1, 2) and a fragmentof a felt mat (fig. 3, 12, 13) from the Mari burial-ground at Rusenikhino dating fromthe 9 th-11 th centuries. These were unique finds and, as regards the technique used for creat-ing patterns, the felt rugs reveal a similarity with felt items made by the Turkic-speakingnomads of Central Asia and Southern Siberia. Comparison of archaeological data andethnographic materials has made it possible to explain the semantic significance of felt inthe funerary rite. Felt was linked with the rite for crossing from one world into another.