The Sarmatian cultures of Ukraine have some standout female burials, many of which appear to belong to priestesses. Their gold regalia usually includes headdresses, some quite tall, as well as spangles embossed with deities, animals, symbols and even ritual scenes, which mix older steppe themes with Hellenic influences due to Greek colonization of the Black Sea region.

This golden kalathos (a shape favored in Greek art) was found in one of three tombs in the massive mound Bolshaya Bliznitsa (which is 15 m tall). Unlike the much earlier kurgans, its interior was built with stone vaulting. It lies near a wealthy trading center on the Taman peninsula, across the Kerch strait from Crimea. You'll often seen this eastern region referred to as the Kuban, after the river that runs through it, and it has some of the most impressive burials of Sarmatian women. Below the kalathos is a band of artificial hair.

Chased depictions of Amazons battling griffins appear around the entire circumference of the gold plate covering the headdress base.

I was glad to find color pictures of the headdress, which I found only as drawings back in the 70s in a Russian archaeological journal. But so typically, I could not find a photo of the most impressive panel, showing an Amazon flanked by griffins. She is wielding a sagaris (battle axe with curved blade on one side, point on the other) which is frequently depicted in Greek vase paintings, but also (as Adrienne Mayor documents in her book The Amazons) has been found in actual burials of women warriors in western Asia.

These graves date to the 6th to 4th century bce. Here's a drawing showing the scale of the Bolshaya Blitnitsa ("great twins") mound:

Here's a golden spangle from the robe of the priestess (conjectured to represent Persephone). Hellenic influence is evident throughout, including Greek letters, and yet the Sarmatian cultural context (not least the presence of powerful women) is still present.

Was this a matriarchy? No. The Sarmatians were Indo-Europeans, specifically speakers of an Indo-Iranian language, who followed the Scythians. It's probable that they like their relatives were patrilineal; certainly they were class-ranked and militarized. But, the Greek form of their name, Sauromatae, is associated with the Amazons. Herodotus related that they sprang from a union of Scythian men with Amazon women. The prominence of Sarmatian women definitely shows the existence of public female authority.

Here's a reconstruction of another woman's headdress and jewelry from Mound No. 22 near Kamenka village (Nikolaev region, SE of Kiev, Ukraine). Her crown is also of kalathos type, also with grifffins, and some very characteristically Greek symbols (are those pendant poppy capsules, or pomegranate flowers?). This drawing shows a cloth top, suggested by the photos above.

A lecture from Prof. D. Braund, "The priestess at Bolshaya Bliznitsa and Aphrodite Ourania in the Bosporan kingdom," shows that I am not the only one to suggest that these prominent women were priestesses. (Indeed, Jeanine Davis Kimball stated this decades ago.) But his talk also identified for me that these gold plaques of an Amazon dancer and a probably maenad (they appear frequently in Black Sea Sarmatian art) originated in her tomb.

I'll look for a photo essay I did several years ago on the Amazon dancer theme (which written sources alluded to but did not bother to illustrate). The hands joined over her head is a constant, and so is her leaping dance, ancestral to the kazochka / kazatzka of the Cossack Tatars.

Anyway, the video lecture makes some interesting connections showing the expansion of Aphrodite Ourania into this northern Black Sea region. (This "heavenly" Greek goddess originates in the Levant, from Ashkelon according to some Greek writers. Here's a pendant showing her riding a swan or goose, from Elizavetovskoye, 2rd century bce. Hellenic art frequently shows the goddess in this way.

Braund also shows several coins depicting Aphrodite Ourania, this one struck by a widowed queen who became the ruler of the Bosporan kingdom. She has a kalathos headdress draped with a veil.

Another coin shows a very un-Greek-looking goddess surrounded by myrtle, a plant strongly associated with Aphrodite, which was issued in the reign of king Sauromates I (note name!) around 100 bce.

I'll throw this very Greek jewelry in, depicting the titanis Thetis riding on a hippocamp (sea-horse, rear end fish) as she was commonly shown. (Much more about her in my book, excerpts coming!)

She is shown carrying armor (cuirass and greaves) to her son Akhilles, who became associated with this northern region.

Lastly, this golden seal of Artemis with her bow (and, unusually, the kalathos headdress) from somewhere in the Boshoran kingdom.

Oh, one more: an enthroned Hera from Belozerka, earring or pendant.

I'll do another section on gold regalia from women's graves (or depicting goddesses) in the Kuban and other Sarmatian regions.