Samara Bend

{{Short description|Large hairpin bend of the middle Volga river}}

{{Coord|53|07|N|50|04|E|display=title}}

File:Samara River 51.64461E 53.11661N.jpg

The Samara Bend (Samarskaya Luka; {{Langx|ru|Самарская Лука}}) is a large hairpin bend of the middle Volga River to the east where it meets the Samara River. It is situated in the Samara region of Russia.

As the Volga enters its middle course it reaches the Zhiguli Mountains. The Samara Bend is formed as the river circles these hills.{{cite web|url=http://int.rgo.ru/news/samara-bend/|title=Samara Bend|date=10 May 2011|publisher=Russian Geographical Society|access-date=10 December 2013}} The Samara Bend National Park, one of the first in the USSR, was established in 1984. Some pockets of the park's territory are among the northernmost points of the Great European Steppe.

The Samara Bend is noted for a remarkable succession of archaeological cultures from 7000 BC to 4000 BC. These sites have revealed Europe's earliest pottery (Elshanka culture),{{cite book | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=nLIufwC4szwC&pg=PA149 | title=The Horse, the Wheel, and Language: How Bronze-Age Riders from the Eurasian Steppes Shaped the Modern World | isbn=9780691148182 | last1=Anthony | first1=David W. | date=August 15, 2010 | publisher=Princeton University Press }} the world's oldest horse burial and signs of horse worship (the Syezzheye cemetery of Samara culture),{{cite book | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=x5J9rn8p2-IC&pg=PA330 | title=The Origin of the Indo-Iranians | isbn=9789004160545 | last1=Kuzʹmina | first1=Elena Efimovna | year=2007 | publisher=BRILL }} and the earliest kurgans associated with Proto-Indo-Europeans (e.g., Krivoluchye assigned to Khvalynsk cultureMarija Gimbutas. The Prehistory of Eastern Europe. Part 1 (1956). P. 55.).