Tracing Early 9th-Century Islamic Silver Flows: New Evidence from Tsarino (Mayaki) on the Donets River, Ukraine / Śledzenie napływów islamskiego srebra na początku IX wieku: nowe dowody z Tsarino (Mayaki) nad Dońcem, Ukraina

Stepan Stepanenko, Leibniz-Zentrum für Archäologie;

Membre associé, CNRS UMR 8167

ORCID: 0000-0003-1598-0032

Eric Ollivier, College de France missions in the Middle East and Central Asia, Paris

ORCID: 0000-0001-8212-6464

Hennadii Svystun, Municipal Establishment “Kharkiv Humanitarian-Pedagogical

Academy” of the Kharkiv Regional Council

ORCID: 0000-0001-7446-0809

Ievheniia Kaluhina, Municipal Institution “Sloviansk Museum of Local History”

ORCID: 0009-0004-7317-4738

Tracing Early 9th-Century Islamic Silver Flows: New Evidence from Tsarino (Mayaki) on the Donets River, Ukraine

Abstract: This article publishes and contextualises a dirham hoard recovered from the Tsarino (Mayaki) hillfort on the middle Siverskyi Donets (Donetsk oblast, Ukraine). The deposit was identified in 2015 during recovery work connected with Second World War remains, in an eroded section of terrain exposing redeposited archaeological strata, which limits precise reconstruction of the original deposition context. The assemblage has a terminus post quem of AH 195/AD 810–811 and belongs to the first major wave of Islamic silver movement into eastern Europe. Numismatic composition is dominated by ʽAbbāsid issues, with a pronounced Maghrebi component (ca. 27%) and a mint distribution consistent with early 9th-century routes operating through Khazar-controlled or Khazar-associated interfaces north of the Caucasus. The hoard is assessed against longstanding historiographic debates on the Donets hillforts, variously interpreted as a linear frontier chain or as locally grounded fortified districts responding to shifting security conditions. The paper argues that the Tsarino hoard supports an understanding of the Donets corridor as a contact zone where crossings, settlement systems, and long-distance exchange intersected prior to the mid-9th-century escalation of steppe conflict.

Key words: Islamic coinage, medieval trade, medieval economy, Saltiv-Mayaki culture, Ukrainian archaeology

DOI: https://doi.org/10.52800/ajst.1.20.a8

Stepanenko, S., Ollivier, E., Svystun, H. and Kaluhina, I. 2025. “Tracing Early 9th-Century Islamic Silver Flows: New Evidence from Tsarino (Mayaki) on the Donets River, Ukraine”, Notae Numismaticae – Zapiski Numizmatyczne 20: 147–198. DOI: https://doi.org/10.52800/ajst.1.20.a8