ИСТИНА

Ukek is one of the earliest cities found by Mongols in the Lower Volga region – domain of Khan of the Golden Horde. The necropolises of the city provide valuable information of its ethno-religious history. A Christian cemetery hasn’t been found so far in Ukek though Christian population of the city was probably quite numerous. Most of medieval cemeteries found at the site are Islamic with fairly unified burial customs with just rare cases of remnants of paganism. But there are substantial differences in social status of people buried in different necropolises. In the South-West necropolis several elite pagan buri- als containing expensive grave goods and probably related to Mongols were excavated. One of the biggest Golden Horde mausoleums (273 m2) known to date was also found there. In contrast, the North-West necropolis while being purely Islamic probably represents lower social class. Craniological samples from the site tend to confirm archeological data on ethnical and cultural heterogeneity of the city’s population. A sample collected from elite burials excavated at different places of the former city’s area reminds population of other big Golden Horde’s cities from the Lower Volga. But a sample from North-West necropolis is much closer to medieval Finno-Ugrian and Slavonic groups