Margiana, part of the Bactria-Margiana Archaeological Complex, also known as the Oxus Civilisation, was a culture in Central Asia that broadly occupied an area that is today much of Turkmenistan and parts of some neighbours. It is thought to have reached its peak between roughly 2200 and 1700 BCE, but very little is known about it due to no written language yet being discovered, and no apparent references to it from neighbouring cultures, although it clearly traded with them. The land was rich in many resources, particularly metals and semi-precious stones, including lapis lazuli, and many objects made of these materials have been found, both in the area and as far as the Indus Valley and Egypt. In this set, Linear-A have presented us with a tableau of a lapis lazuli mine.

Mines were one of the very worst places you could possibly be in the ancient world. They remained unpleasant and dangerous throughout all of history, but in the ancient world they were often worked by slaves, prisoners of war or other forced labour. At the best of times, conditions were terrible in every possible way, and the risk of death or serious injury was never far away. Of course, what they could yield made the effort worthwhile, at least for those who did not have to actually go underground, and the metals and other resources could be used to fashion weapons, jewellery, household items, or simply sold elsewhere for a profit. Therefore all ancient civilisations did their best to exploit the resources they found beneath them, although to have a model made of this activity is certainly unusual and quite surprising.

We will begin by discussing the mine as it is modelled here, and while we are certainly no mining experts, it is clear that this is a representation of a mine rather than any sort of an actual depiction. Compare the actual model as pictured above with the model as shown on the box. Linear-A always show their products nicely painted on the box, but here they have gone a lot further, and shown the contents used to build a whole diorama. As you see, this requires much more than just what we find in the box, although it does help to explain how the mine section is to be put together. Without all the extra ‘earth’ and other elements, the model by itself does not make a huge amount of sense, and even when following the picture on the box we still found no apparent use for the set of three steps, which do not appear. Still, the box shows what the designer had in mind, and is a good diorama.

The mine as actually put together measures 105 mm in width, and 58 mm to the top of the ‘shaft’. We would have thought that a mine that is working a seam only two or three metres below the surface would be open cast rather than digging shafts and tunnels, especially when the seam is so wide that a man can easily stand upright in the tunnel, as here. There are no pit props despite the large cavity, and the texture of the wall and roof is that of a rocky piece of land rather than the chiselled effect you would expect in mines cutting through solid rock. The apparent entrance to a lower shaft to the left of the model is curious too – perhaps there is a parallel seam a few metres directly below the one we can see? - but mining is not our speciality, so we shall say no more, except that the various pieces fit together easily through pegs and holes, but will need gluing, and the roof of the tunnel (and the shaft) are unsupported except on the back wall, and so may need extra help to stay in place. The pot-like thing in the top row baffled us for a bit until we saw it was being hung from the tunnel roof, so presumably contains oil or something that provides a little light. This too will need gluing in place.

Moving on to the figures in this set, the top row represents the miners themselves. Clearly this was hot and dirty work, so such men would have typically worn just a loincloth, or nothing at all, so these figures look perfectly reasonable to us. One man hacks at the face with an axe while the next two are in the process of filling a basket. The last two poses are carrying the filled baskets – one is climbing the ladder of the shaft. Both take some of the weight of the basket with a strap around the head, which is a time-honoured practice so makes sense here.

The second row covers the management. As we have said, mining was generally forced labour, so you would need some armed men to make sure everything went smoothly, the workforce did not run away, and this month’s production target was reached. Here we find three guards armed with long spears and wearing long kilts. One wears something like a jacket while another has a garment cut like a waistcoat and the third is bare-chested. The first wears a hood, the second has nothing on his head and the third an interesting form of cap. Next we have a woman carrying two jugs – perhaps refreshment for the miners, or the guards, or something else. Her hair is covered and she wears a long dress with what looks like a rope wound round her body for some reason. Finally there is what must be the supervisor, or indeed the owner, because this gentleman is richly dressed in a long robe and coat, and wears a very impressive tall cap. Unfortunately we could find no sources for the appearance of guards, or civilians, or anyone else in the Oxus civilisation, so cannot comment on the authenticity here (almost certainly the answer is ‘no-one knows’), but nothing leaps out at us as being unlikely, and they certainly look good.

The poses seem fine to us. All are very lifelike and natural, and the climbing miner fits comfortably onto the ladder. The sculpting is the usual excellent quality for Linear-A 3-D printed figures, with good anatomy on the workers and nice details everywhere, including nice slender shafts for the spears. The guard’s clothing has an interesting crinkly texture to it that presumably implies some form of material (perhaps grass or reeds?), but we couldn’t guess what it was. The shields too have an interesting pattern, which perhaps suggests a wicker construction, or maybe just a pattern? Nevertheless these are attractive figures, and of course, being 3-D printed, they come without the need for assembly, nor any flash or other unwanted plastic. The miners without bases do not have any means of attachment, which means they can be placed anywhere in the mine setting, but do require some means of keeping them in place as they do not stand.

This is clearly a very unusual collection, and since it depicts such a poorly-understood ancient civilisation, we were completely unable to make any worthwhile judgement as to its accuracy. Certainly nothing here seems particularly wrong to us, given that the ‘mine’ is no more than a display piece for the figures. Since the mine comes in several parts, you could purchase several sets to create a larger piece should you choose, but to create a plausible scene you would need to put in a fair amount of work to get something such as is shown on the box. All the figures are very nicely made, and in realistic poses, so in general terms this looks like a great set of figures. We may not know enough about mining in Margiana to know if the costumes are accurate, but if you are looking for a 1/72 scale set of ancient miners then this is almost certainly the set to buy.