World History and Culture: The exhibition “Crossroads of Worlds. Arkaim” opened in the Kolomenskoe Museum-Reserve

The exhibition Crossroads of Worlds. Arkaim was opened in the Kolomenskoe Museum-Reserve (Podklet of the Palace of Tsar Alexey Mikhailovich) on July 5, 2022.

For the first time in Moscow, the Museum-Reserve showcases unique archeological artifacts from the series of monuments of the Bronze Age. The most famous of them, Arkaim, was discovered in Southern Ural steppes 35 years ago.

Arkaim is as old, as England’s Stonehenge and Egypt’s pyramids. This fortified settlement of the middle Bronze Age of the XXI-XVII centuries B.C. was discovered by the archeological exhibition of the Chelyabinsk State University in 1987.

The Bronze Age, including the “Arkaim” period, in many ways set the directions of the development of humankind that we know today: technological specializations and innovations, large-scale architectural structures, social transformations, communication development, universal urbanization, and globalization.

Arkaim is a settlement built according to a universal architectural project, and surrounded by powerful defence structures – a wall and a moat. Within the settlement, a graveyard is located, where the residents were buried. According to various estimates, the population of Arkaim was up to 2.5 thousand people that anthropologists ascribe to Caucasian anthtropological type. This is one of the settlements of the so-called Country of Towns that includes over 20 fortified settlements and necropolises.

The exhibition Arkaim. Country of Towns went extremely successful in France in 2010-2011 and in Kazan in 2013. In 2022, the Moscow State Integrated Museum-Reserve hosts the archeological exposition on its own territory. At first, it may seem like Arkaim and Kolomenskoe have nothing in common, but this is not true.

One of the biggest archeological collections of the country is kept at the Kolomenskoe Museum-Reserve. It features around a hundred thousand museum items that mostly tell about the so-called Dyakovo Culture. Therefore the exhibition Crossroads of Worlds. Arkaim will serve as a unique “dialogue” between two cultures.

The main participants of the exhibition are the museums of Southern Ural. Six museum collections are displayed in the exhibition hall Podklet (Ground Floor) of the Palace of Tsar Alexey Mikhailovich. The exposition features 656 exhibits, including latest archeological findings – items of metal, bones, stone, bronze and gold jewelry, ceramic pieces, anthropological portraits, reconstructions of clothes, models of houses. Visitors will have an opportunity to learn about religious beliefs of ancient Arkaim residents, their households and everyday lives, and to explore ancient technologies. The exhibition is complemented by unique documents provided by the State Archive of the Russian Federation, as well as photographs, journals, and archeological tools. Works by modern artists and designers of Southern Ural, who were inspired by Arkaim, are also featured in the exhibition.

The exhibition will run until September 11, 2022.