JOURNAL OF CRITICAL REVIEWS ISSN- 2394-5125 VOL 7, ISSUE 12, 2020 REVIEW OF CAUSES AND ORIGINS OF CRANIAL TREPANATION IN THE SARMATIAN CULTURE OF THE LOWER VOLGA REGION Evgeny V. Pererva1 1Volgograd Institute of Management, Branch of the Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration»Gagarin Street, building 8, Volgograd, Russia 400066, ORCID 0000-0001-8285-44612
[email protected] Received: 14 Feb 2020 Revised and Accepted: 25 April 2020 ABSTRACT:The cranial trepanation is one of the most frequently performed operations on human skull by modern and ancient surgeons. In the scientific literature trepanation is often associated with the widespread manipulations in ancient peoples` bodies, such as deliberated head or extremities deformation, scalping, artificial scarification, decapitation, truncation of limbs, etc. Nowadays it is known that trepanation is the therapeutic or ritual manipulation performed in vivo or posthumously by various techniques. Reconsideration of all these criteria allows anthropologists evaluating the nature of development of medical knowledge of ancient societies; determining the degree of technical sophistication of ancient doctors and comprehending the traditions and customs of peoples who lived on earth in the distant past. The paper endeavors to summarize and consider cases of craniotomy on the materials dating back to the Sarmatian era. The presented study also provides an evaluation of the cases described from the point of view of the technique of carrying out the surgeries and other manipulations, and the reasons for their conduct. An attempt was made to find the sources of the spread of the tradition of skull trepanation in the nomadic peoples of the Early Iron Age inhabited the Lower Volga region.