Gold threads from the high-status Alan burial near the Pegushin farmstead in the Stavropol region

Though the burial chamber of an aristocratic Alan catacomb (the end ofthe 4th - turn of the 5th century AD) from kurgan 15, Pegushin 1 cemetery, in the StavropolRegion was completely plundered, fragments of gold threads which once decorated a clothwere identified there. The paper reports on the reconstruction of the thread productiontechnique and identification of the chemical composition of the metal the threads weremade of. The results were obtained by a low-vacuum observation with the use of a ТМ3030Hitachi В tabletop electronic microscope conducted in the Department of Archaeology andenergy-dispersive X-ray phase analysis carried out with the use of a M1 MISTRAL XRFspectrometer in the Department of Archaeological Sites of the State Historical Museum.Whereas it is not yet possible to identify the provenance of the gold threads from Pegushin1 reliably, the entire context of this assemblage is indicative of the western direction of thelinks. At the same time constructive similarity of the Pegushin catacomb with catacombsfrom the Middle Terek sites reflects migration of large population groups led by militarychieftains to the Kuma River basin, i.e. the northern periphery of the Alan world abuttingthe steppes, in the Hun period.