Archaeologists have discovered a felted swan in a burial mound in Siberia. It is believed to belong to the Pazyryk culture, a people from the Iron Age.
Along with other treasures, this nearly 30 cm tall swan was found in a burial mound in the Pazyryk Valley of the Altai Mountains, near the borders of Russia with Kazakhstan, China, and Mongolia.
The Iron Age felted swan from Siberia is made from reindeer wool and symbolizes air, earth, and water. (Photo: Dima Moroz).
Archaeologists estimate that the statue dates back to the 5th or 4th century BC. Its body is made from reindeer wool that has been processed into white felt, while the beak, eyes, and wings are crafted from black felt. Brown-red felt is used for the “feet,” and the body is stuffed with reindeer wool.
The feet contain wooden supports that keep the swan upright. Curators at the Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg, where the statue is displayed, believe that these wooden supports were used to place the swan on a nearby wooden cart or possibly on top of a long-decayed tent-like structure erected over the burial mound.
According to the museum, the swan symbolizes life in three realms: air, earth, and water. The swan or a similar waterfowl may also feature in a mythological narrative about creation. There is a common concept of the universe’s creation by a swan, duck, or goose, which is characteristic of many ancient cosmological beliefs.
According to the University of Washington, U.S. archaeologists from the Soviet Union began excavating ancient burial mounds in the Pazyryk Valley in the 1920s and uncovered the felt swan in 1949. Due to the area’s high altitude and cold climate, many burial mounds remain frozen, preserving a variety of organic materials, including human remains.
