85 Eckhard Deschler-Erb, Philippe Della Casa (eds.). New Research on Ancient Bronzes. Acta of the XVIIIth International Congress on Ancient Bronzes. Zurich Studies in Archaeology, Vol. 10, 2015, 85–88. Ancient Bronzes from the 1 -Century-B. C. “Akhtanizovskaya-4” Settlement in the Taman Peninsula 1. Introduction The “Akhtanizovskaya 4” fortiied settlement, in the north- eastern part of the modern Taman peninsula (Russia, Kras- nodar area) (ig. 1), was found during exploratory work conducted by the Institute of Archaeology, Academy of Sciences of the USSR in 1982 (Paromov 1994, 175–178). Since 2004 the settlement has been excavated by the ex- pedition of the State Historical Museum, Moscow, headed by G. Lomtadze. It is situated on a cape and separated from the mainland by a moat and a rampart, with the citadel lo- cated in the protruding part of the cape. The stratigraphy of the settlement and the analysis of the inds suggest that the settlement called “Akhtanizovskaya 4” existed until no later than the end of 1 st century. B. C. It was most likely in a chain of the defense system created on the eastern borders of the Bosporan Kingdom during the rule of Asander (47–17 B. C.) and destroyed during the tumultuous events of that time, though up to now no layers of ire or destructions which may be associated with military activities have been un- covered at the settlement (Lomtadze 2010, 164–166). (Lomtadze) 2. Description and analysis of the bronzes 2.1. Palmette-leaf During the ield season of 2011 there was found a massive cast-bronze palmette-leaf with eleven petals and symmet- rical side tendrils at the base of the palmette, which go into two curved undecorated strips connected to each other. Georgiy Lomtadze & Mikhail Treister Dr. Georgiy Lomtadze, State Historical Museum, Red Square 1, RUS-109012 Moscow, gylomtadze@mail.ru Dr. habil. Mikhail Treister, Deutsches Archäologisches Institut, Podbielskiallee 69–71, D-14195 Berlin, mikhail.treister@dainst.de This paper is devoted to bronzes found during the excavations of the fortiied settlement known as “Akhtanizovskaya 4” in the Taman peninsula. One of the bronzes is a palmette-leaf with tendrils from a candelabrum, another – an upper part of a large open-mouthed vessel. The XRF-analyses of the vessel fragment shows a high zinc content in the multi-compo- nent alloy comparable with those in the Early Imperial sestertii and dupondii. The palmette-leaf may be dated by its style between the 1 st century B. C. and the 1 st century A. D. As the settlement existed no later than the late 1 st century B. C. an earlier date within this period is most likely. Key words: Black Sea, Taman Peninsula, Akhtanizovskaya 4, candelabra, alloy with zinc Fig. 1. Map of the North Pontic area with the location of the settlement Akhtanizovskaya-4. (M. Treister) st