The first knives in the Volga Bulgaria were stone-made. As time went on, the items were furnished with bone or wooden handles. The adjacent to the palm part was called the back, and the rest elements were called the belly and the head.
In the 10th century along with agriculture and trade, handicrafts including the art of bone carving began to develop in the Volga Bulgaria. One of the mass categories of artifacts in the Bulgar complexes is bone and horn-made items. Archaeologists discovered both the items and their blanks, though the traces of workshops have not been found.
Not only knife handles were made from animal bones. Household articles, horse harness, and ornaments were found by experts in the ancient settlements. There were even dice and chess pieces among the findings.
In the first half of the 20th century, the archaeologist Aleksey Smirnov studied the Bulgar people bone processing techniques. He found out that the local craftsmen used sophisticated carving techniques, and followed certain shapes and sizes as well. Due to this evidence, Smirnov suggested that in the 10th-13th centuries there were bone carvers’ associations and even a primitive standardization system in Volga Bulgaria. The researcher also thought that Bilyar and Bolgar were the main bone carving centers since it was the very place where the biggest part of the bone findings was discovered.
For the Bulgar peoples, bone carving was the result of a thrifty attitude towards cattle breeding products. At that time all the parts of the animal were used: meat was used for food, the veins and intestines were used for making ropes, the skin was used in sewing clothes, and the bones were — to carve knives and other objects. However, the craftsmen used not only local material. On the commission of the nobility, they made jewelry and knives from expensive imported materials: walrus’s or mammoth’s tusks.
The Bolgar Museum-Reserve collection contains a bone handle of the knife. It is decorated with three rows of circular and linear ornaments. Circular ornament is one of the most common decorative elements of that time products. It consisted of circles rows with a dot in the center. It could be found both on the Bulgar products and Russian and Siberian craftsmen’s products as well.
In the 10th century along with agriculture and trade, handicrafts including the art of bone carving began to develop in the Volga Bulgaria. One of the mass categories of artifacts in the Bulgar complexes is bone and horn-made items. Archaeologists discovered both the items and their blanks, though the traces of workshops have not been found.
Not only knife handles were made from animal bones. Household articles, horse harness, and ornaments were found by experts in the ancient settlements. There were even dice and chess pieces among the findings.
In the first half of the 20th century, the archaeologist Aleksey Smirnov studied the Bulgar people bone processing techniques. He found out that the local craftsmen used sophisticated carving techniques, and followed certain shapes and sizes as well. Due to this evidence, Smirnov suggested that in the 10th-13th centuries there were bone carvers’ associations and even a primitive standardization system in Volga Bulgaria. The researcher also thought that Bilyar and Bolgar were the main bone carving centers since it was the very place where the biggest part of the bone findings was discovered.
For the Bulgar peoples, bone carving was the result of a thrifty attitude towards cattle breeding products. At that time all the parts of the animal were used: meat was used for food, the veins and intestines were used for making ropes, the skin was used in sewing clothes, and the bones were — to carve knives and other objects. However, the craftsmen used not only local material. On the commission of the nobility, they made jewelry and knives from expensive imported materials: walrus’s or mammoth’s tusks.
The Bolgar Museum-Reserve collection contains a bone handle of the knife. It is decorated with three rows of circular and linear ornaments. Circular ornament is one of the most common decorative elements of that time products. It consisted of circles rows with a dot in the center. It could be found both on the Bulgar products and Russian and Siberian craftsmen’s products as well.
