The analysis of the discoid braid ornament from Andreyevskaya Shhel (Anapa, Russia) (10th century)

The subject of this article is the fragmentary silver plate of a gilded silver sheet braid ornament decorated with palmette motifs, which was deposited in the storage of the Gorgippia Archaeological Museum (Krasnodar Krai, Russia) in 2015, together with several other finds. The finds had been discovered at a site named Andreyevskaya Shhel, located   few kilometres south-east of the town, at the north-western hill area of the Caucasus. Among the artefacts deposited in the storage in 2015, there were other finds related to the 9–10th centuries (e.g. silver plate of a sabretache, gilded bronze belt mounts, bronze strap end, sabre, bow case or sabretache mount, fingering, etc). The braid ornament, with many analogies in the Carpathian Basin, could have reached the North Caucasian region by means of long-distance trade. This hypothesis is sustained by the considerable dirham-finds in the Carpathian Basin, which indicate the integration of this region – and of early Hungarian commerce as a whole – into the Eastern, Muslim trade network.