Study of the Golden Horde city of Ukek in the Saratov Volga region

In July 2024, the Institute of Archaeology named after A.Kh. Khalikov of the Tatarstan Academy of Sciences jointly with the Historical Park “My History” (Saratov), continued  a many years archaeological research of two Golden Horde sites in the Saratov Volga region: the Uvek settlement (Golden Horde city of Ukek) and the Khmelevka-1 settlement in the district of Ukek. The work is carried out as a part of the State Task of the Republic of Tatarstan “Preservation of the national identity of the Tatar people”..

The Uvek settlement is the remains of the Golden Horde city of Ukek and is located on the southern outskirts of Saratov. Its territory is densely occupied by the private properties of the village of Uvek, so it is difficult to find a site free of development for excavations. Nevertheless, this field season the archaeological team led by R.R. Valiev after dismantling the remains of modern buildings on one of the private plots in the central part of the settlement managed to lay an excavation of 184 sq. m..

The excavation consisted of 3-three sites (sectors), one of which revealed 3 objects of the Golden Horde period under the layer of modern ballast, made of fragments of burned and raw bricks. Two of the objects turned out to be a collapse of the walls of above-ground buildings, made of raw bricks of two shades (brown and greenish), laid in the form of a herringbone (zigzag). The third structure is the wall of a brick building, partially destroyed by current garbage pits. The lower part of the wall, 1 m wide, is built by masonry with one or two faces and rubble between them, i.e. on the edge, the masonry is made of burned bricks, inside – of raw bricks, laid flat. The wall is preserved to a height of 4-5 bricks. The construction is tentatively dated to the XIV century. Despite the small number of mass finds (fragments of ceramics, animal bones), the abundance of copper and silver coins, mainly minted in the 1330s-1360s, attracts attention. 150 of them found during the excavation.

Khmelevka-1 settlemen is located to the south of the Golden Horde city of Ukek and is synchronous with this center. On the area of 60 square meters 11 household pits and one tandoor were found. Among the individual finds are a chessman (pawn) and a draught. Probably, these horn items were made at the site under study, since the finds from the excavation show traces of bone-carving. Iron slags and ceramic flaw were also found. The research materials are undergoing primary processing.