Bronze Age mega-settlement in Kazakhstan has advanced urban planning, metallurgy

Summary

Archaeologists in northeastern Kazakhstan have discovered a remarkable Bronze Age settlement that is changing the ways scholars understand life, technology, and social organization across the Eurasian steppe. The 140-hectare Semiyarka site commands a plateau above the Irtysh River and represents one of the most extensive and sophisticated settlements ever documented in this vast region.Drone photograph of the archaeological site of Semiyarka, looking from the south-east to the north-west (photograph by Peter J. Brown). Credit: M. Radivojević et al., Antiquity (2025)Semiyarka, dating from around 1600 BCE and associated with the Cherkaskul and Alekseevka–Sargary cultural traditions, challenges the previously held view regarding the nature of steppe settlements as small-scale, mobile camps. Instead, it offers evidence of a carefully planned urban landscape that features rectilinear earthworks, enclosed domestic compounds, and a monumental central structure likely serving administrative or ceremonial functions. Its layout testifies to a community that planned its environment with precision, creating an organized settlement unlike anything previously identified in the steppe zone.Large-scale tin-bronze production has also been uncovered by archaeological surveys and excavations. Clusters of slag, crucibles, and metal artifacts point to an industrial zone within the settlement for copper and tin processing. Although small-scale workshops have been reported elsewhere in Central Asia, nothing on this scale or level of organization has previously been recorded in this part of Kazakhstan. The position of the settlement not far from the Altai Mountains, rich in metals, suggests that Semiyarka was an important node within more extensive Eurasian networks of exchange, with the distribution of tin bronze, one of the most crucial materials of the period, reaching far beyond the steppe.Corona spy photograph of Semiyarka (KH4B Mission 1116, April 1972). Credit: M. Radivojević et al....