Potapovka culture () was a Bronze Age culture which flourished on the middle Volga in 2100–1800 BC.
The Potapovka culture emerged from the Poltavka culture with influences from the Abashevo culture. It had close relations with the Sintashta culture in the east, with whom it shares many similarities. Like the Sintashta culture, its people are believed to have spoken a form of Proto-Indo-Iranian. It was directly ancestral to the Srubnaya culture, and probably influenced the emergence of the Andronovo culture.
Chronology
The Potapovka culture emerged on the middle Volga around 2100 BC. It came to flourish around the middle Volga, the southwest Urals and western Kazakhstan. Potapovka sites are eventually found also on the Don and the Dnieper. The Potapovka culture has been considered a western variant of the Sintashta culture,
In a genetic study published in Science in 2018, the remains four individuals ascribed to the Potapovka culture was analyzed. Of the two males, one carried R1a1a1b2a2a and U2e1, while the other carried R1 and C. The two females carried U2e1a1 and H2a1e. People of the Potapovka culture were found to be closely related to people of the Corded Ware culture, the Sintashta culture, the Andronovo culture and the Srubnaya culture. These were found to harbor mixed ancestry from the Yamnaya culture and peoples of the Central European Middle Neolithic. The genetic data suggested that these related cultures were ultimately derived from a remigration of Central European peoples with steppe ancestry back into the steppe.
Linguistics
The Potapovka culture is thought to belong to an eastward migration of Indo-European-speakers who eventually emerged as the Indo-Iranians. David W. Anthony considers the Potapovka culture and the Sintashta culture as archaeological manifestations of the early Indo-Iranian languages.