The Jewish Communities of Central Asia in the Medieval and Early Modern Periods

When the Jews first settled in Central Asia is uncertain, but circumstantial evidence clearly indicates that this happened at least two and a half thousand years ago. In the first millennium AD, the Jews lived only in cities no farther than 750?km east of the Caspian sea (in the eighth–eleventh centuries the sea was called Khazarian). Only later did they migrate to the central part of the region, to cities like Samarkand and Bukhara. It is possible that Jews from Khazaria joined them, since they already had tight trade connections with Central Asia and China. There is no trace of evidence regarding the existence of Jews in the entirety of Central Asia in the early sixteenth century. At the very end of the sixteenth century Bukhara became the new ethnoreligious center of the Jews in that region. In the first half of the nineteenth century, thanks to European travelers visiting Central Asia at that time, the term “Bukharan Jews” was assigned to this sub-ethnic Jewish group. Drawing on a wide range of primary and secondary source materials, this article aims to prove that the presence of Jews in Central Asia was not continuous, and therefore the modern Bukharan Jews are not descendants of the first Jewish settlers there. It also attempts to determine where Central Asia’s first Jewish population disappeared to.     

Sepulchral Brasses,and Incised Slabs

A Middle Anglo-Saxon cemetery at Chesterton Lane Corner, Cambridge, has been radiocarbon dated to the seventh to ninth centuries with its floruit in the eighth century and evidence that many of the individuals buried there were executed. Intriguingly, there is also a Late Roman decapitation burial at the site. The evidence for Middle Anglo-Saxon Cambridge is reviewed and the relationship between justice and central places is considered.     

Notes on Certain Objects of Stag–s Horn Used for Hafting Stone Implements or Weapons

Part of a cemetery of uncertain extent was excavated following its discovery during work upon a late prehistoric and Roman rural settlement. At least four of the inhumations appeared to lie within square-ditched enclosures with entrances on the east. Bone survival was very poor but one skeleton, from a double burial, was dated to the mid-seventh century and was probably female. The practice of square-ditched burial is discussed and it is suggested that the burials are a widespread but uncommon form of secular elite burial in areas outside Saxon control.     

Calcium oxalate AMS C dating and chronology of post-Palaeolithic rock paintings in the Iberian Peninsula. Two dates from Abrigo de los Oculados (Henarejos,Cuenca, Spain)

Since 2005 we have been utilizing accelerator mass spectrometry (AMS) ¹⁴C dating in research on calcium oxalate crusts associated with open air rock art of the Iberian Peninsula. In this paper we present two dates linked with three eye-idol pictographs at Abrigo de los Oculados (Henarejos, Cuenca, Spain). Radiocarbon ages for these motifs agree with the expected iconography-based archaeological chronology. Such oxalate dates could provide an independent basis for evaluating chronological theories for post-Palaeolithic sites, designated in the UNESCO World Heritage List as Rock Art of the Mediterranean Basin on the Iberian Peninsula.