Authors Mariyashev A. N.
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Scientists of Kazakhstan started the research work of petroglyphic art relatively recently. For many years specialists had a skeptical attitude towards these types of monuments, as there was no method of dating the Petroglyphs. Different scientists could refer one and the same subject to different periods: one to the Stone Age, one to the Saak period, and one to the Bronze Age. These differences in dating the Petroglyphs were connected with objective difficulties: for instance, in order to define the date of burial it is possible to take into consideration the set of funereal equipment. The time can be defined with the help of weapons or dishes located at the headboard, or finally, there is the possibility to involve modern methods of research and carbon dating.
As for the Petroglyphs, everything is different. Hundreds and thousands of images seemed to be created in one and the same time, as they looked alike. But as time passed, archeologists distinguished subjects that could not have appeared in one and the same time. It is well known that battle chariots appeared not earlier than the XVII century Before Christ. By the time of Alexander the Great's campaign they were considered to an antiquated means of attack. On the rocks of Tamgaly are several two- wheeled carriages with rods. In one of these images bulls are harnessed to it, so it is hard to judge if these were battle, hunting, or simply shipping carriages that have been hammed out on these rocks. Among the Petroglyphs in Eshkiolmes there are approximately one hundred plots with chariots, horses are harnessed to them in several images, and on loading platform there are images of coachmen. It is well known that at the very beginning it was used to harness bulls and onagers; as for the battle chariots, they appeared only after people could tame horses and learned how to drive it (table 1).
In mountains Jungari and on the range of Karatau the scenes with archers have been found, they were shooting while standing on a chariot. There are also plots of chasing one chariot by another. According to these plots we can conclude that scenes and separate images of chariots have been hammed out by residents, who lived on the territory of Kazakhstan not earlier than 2nd millennium Before Christ and not later than the end of the I millennium Before Christ. This means that these images are connected with the epoch of developed and late Bronze, or even with the epoch of early nomads.
Many figures of animals and people that are part of the whole composition with chariots can be referred to this epoch, too. However, even by defining the time of the appearance of mentioned above plots in the limits of more than a millennium, researchers will get the date in a very wide range. And only the details of the weapons portrayed in these big groups of Petroglyphs give them the possibility to narrow the chronological timeframe. On the canyons of Tamgaly, Eshkiolmes, and Karatau there are many plots with the images of people with axes, battle-hammers, graze bursts. It is well known that battle-hammers have been used in the battles since late Bronze epoch and were out of use during the last third part of the 1st millennium Before the Christ, that is to say the wide usage of cavalry in the battle was out of usage, as well. In some Petroglyphs it is possible to observe the type of the stone arrowheads and then use it to define the date of those Petroglyphs (fig 22).
There are other methods of defining the date. In Tamgaly there are some unfinished figures of people on the blocks of burial. Blocks have been used as a construction material for building the burial cells since ancient time.
As a stone-made chest cyst has been located several millenniums under the ground, it makes possible to consider that the images have been portrayed not later than the Bronze epoch.
We gave only several examples of how to define the date of Petroglyphs. The fact that petroglyphic art's date can be also defined by their style, can be added to it. It is well known that "animal" style appeared among nomadic group of people and achieved its peak in, approximately, VII-VI centuries Before Christ. In mountains Jungari outstanding samples of Saak art have been discovered. Analogies to them can be found in gold and bronze jewelry from Saak and Skiff burial mounds (Table 2).
It has been considered for a while that Petroglyphs of Old Turk time were extremely schematic and ordinary. New materials do not prove this hypothesis. In mountains Chuili and Jungari beautiful samples of petroglyphic art of this epoch have been discovered (fig 23, 24).
