This widely dispersed cluster is located just south of Hnaberd's lower town (map quad B2h).
The burials lie on the broad plateau that lies behind (to the south of) Hnaberd fortress. The area slopes gently downwards to the north. There is considerable evidence of disturbance to the burials, including one clearly looted using heavy machinery (feature 1).
The burials in this cluster are not particularly numerous given the sprawling extent of the cluster, covering an area approximately 200m north-south by 350m east-west. The burials, including standard, paved, spiral, and mounded cromlechs, vary widely in size, from 3.5 to 4m in diameter. All appear to be built of medium to large, shaped basalt blocks. While most have normal capstones, several (such as feature 1) boast cyclopean basalt boulders as capstones.
Even though the adjacent lower town did yield a modest collection of surface materials (see Ar/Hn), only a single obsidian flake was found on the surface within the area of Hn BC 10.
Feature 1: is a looted spiral cromlech found on the eastern edge of Hn BC 10. 12m in diameter and built of large shaped basalt blocks, this tomb was surmounted by a massive basalt boulder which has recently been pushed to the side to reveal an inner chamber. The chamber was 2.1m by 1.3m and lined with worked basalt slabs. The interior is now overgrown with primary weeds, suggesting the vandalism of the tomb took place not too long before we recorded the feature in 1998. No materials were recovered suggesting the tomb contents were removed intact.
Feature 2: is an extraordinarily large mounded cromlech, 14m in diameter. The outer ring is built of shaped basalt boulders while the interior is constructed of a mound of small tuff and basalt cobbles, 0.60m tall at the center.
In addition to the surface features described above, two cromlechs from Hn BC 4 were excavated in 2000.
Tomb 1 (fig. VI.21, 22) was a small standard cromlech with a N-S diameter of 5.15m and an E-W diameter of 5.35m. The stone outer ring and three capstones were all basalt. The capstones covered an earthen pit, 1.0m wide, 1.8m long, and 0.6m deep. The burial contained a single skeleton, that of a female, 45-55 years old. The cranium had been separated from the post-cranial remains and was sitting upright facing W. The body was lying on its left side, in a very tightly flexed position with the legs pulled close to the chest. The skeleton had several notable particularities. The mandible had been removed and was found resting on top of one of the ceramic vessels (#2). The following bones were missing from the burial: the cervical vertebrae, the sternum, both scapulae, both clavicles, both humeri, both ulnae, and the carpals and metacarpals of both hands. The two radii were found separately from the skeleton and neither had epiphyses. In addition to the skeleton, the grave included select bones of a bull that appear to have been placed in conspicuous arrangements. Most notably, in the southern half of the pit, 5 bones (including the scapula and humerus) were arranged in two E-W lines. The grave inventory also included 8 beads and 2 ceramic vessels.
The excavation of one burial in this cluster was reported in Avetisyan et al. (2000) as Hnaberd cemetery B, tomb 1. In preparing this monograph, all the cemeteries were re-named for consistency and so Hnaberd cemetery B is now Hn BC 10.
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