Orlat Battle Plaque\'s Importance

[Alanus]

Hello MeinPanzer,

I read this thread when it was first posted a little while ago, but I haven't had time to post a comment until now.
Some points:

2. As far as the swords are concerned, this type of sword, like the scabbard slide, was in widespread use in China by 2nd c. BC, but we do not find it outside of China until later. Likewise, the scabbard slide is not found west of China before the 1st c. AD, so the plaque cannot date to earlier than that time period. Moreover, the actual sword found in barrow 2 with the plaques, which is of exactly the type shown on the plaques, is datable no earlier than the 1st c. AD.

If the plaque was an heirloom, which seems the case, there is no reason that it cannot be older than the accompaning sword. And how much later do we find long-gripped Chinese-styled swords outside of China?

Please remember that the scabbard slide was developed north-west of China by the Saka themselves. It has steppe roots, probably adopted by the Chinese about two centuries after its 5th century BC invention in the Altai.

There are numerous other aspects that could be examined, but the bottom line is that the Orlat battle plaque and the other plaques found with it cannot date to before the 1st c. AD, and thus cannot represent Yuezhi, Xiongnu, or other such steppe tribes which were active in the 2nd c. BC.

In the post just above, we find the Wusun/Saka precisely in this geograpical area until the 2nd century AD. Other tribes mentioned-- especially the Xiongnu-- were neighboring this area during the time-period under discussion.

At the same time, we find all of these innovations-- the scabbard slide, the disc pommel, the bow case with two quivers-- on Bosporan stelae before the 2nd century AD. The Bosporus is somewhere around 2,000 km northeast and represents a cultural borrowing from the Sarmatians/Alans who migrated to that vicinity. We are talking about the 1st century BC to the 1st century AD but no later. It's certainly possible that this famous battle was finally recorded on the plaque years AFTER it was actually fought, but to pinpoint the participants as other than Wusun, Huns, or Yuezhi, is an impossibily with the migrational progression.