Philjames100
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I don't know if it was specifically Sintashta in this case or a closely related population, but yes I agree. There also appears to be a contribution from the Catacomb culture. Catacomb seems to have also played a role in the development of chariots, as they had two-wheeled proto-chariot type vehicles with solid wheels, possibly a precursor to the later chariots found in Sintashta:
"In the Black Sea region, the Pit Grave (Yamnaya) period was followed by the Katakombnaya (Catacomb) culture (cal. 2700–1900 BC (Chernykh 2008)), which continued and improved upon the technological innovations of pre-existing people (Kiyashko 2002), including bronze metallurgy and utilization of four-wheeled wagons. To the east, the Pit Grave gave way to the cemeteries of the Poltavka archaeological culture (c. 2700–2100 BC), which occupied the Volga–Ural interfluve (Tkachev 2006; Kiyashko and Sukhorukova 2012). (...) Elaborate burials of the Catacomb culture, especially with wagons and carts, are interpreted as those of high-status people, possibly chiefs and warlords of local communities (Cherednichenko and Pustovalov 1991). At the beginning of this period, the first two-wheeled vehicles in the steppes appeared and were buried in the cemeteries of Tyagunova Mogila (Cherednichenko and Pustovalov 1991; Pustovalov 2008) and Bolshoi Ipatovskyi Kurgan (Korenevskiy et al. 2007), both in the Black Sea region. These carts have small (up to 60 cm diameter), single-piece disk wheels with an integral nave independently rotating on the axle. They can thus be seen as forerunners of an actual chariot, similar to those vehicles known in the Near East at this time. (…)
The site of Sintashta in the steppe zone of the Southern Trans-Urals (the eastern side of the Ural Mountains) was excavated in the 1970s and yielded abundant Bronze Age material, including unparalleled evidence of six vehicles buried in graves, each with two spoked wheels accompanied by cheekpieces and sacrificial horses. (…)
Subsequent archaeological investigations have expanded the area of the chariot complex to the whole Ural–Kazakhstan region, and probably more broadly to the forest-steppes of the Volga–Don interfluve. Evidence of chariots comes mainly from Sintashta sites (16 finds), Petrovka sites (9 finds), and from two Alakul’ sites in the southern Urals and northern Kazakhstan. There are three possible graves of the Abashevo–Pokrovka and Potapovo cultures in the Don–Volga region (Pichaevo kurgan, grave 2; Utevka cemetery, kurgan 6, graves 4 and 6). To date, there are 28 published cases (and at least two known unpublished cases) of chariots in mortuary ritual contexts. (…)
Chariot remains from the Middle and Late Bronze Age in the southern Urals are quite abundant compared with early chariot remains from other parts of the world, and allow statistical analysis. In contrast, only two wagons and one sledge were found in the Royal Cemetery of Ur (Woolley 1965), and only ten actual chariots and their parts are known from tombs of the New Kingdom of Egypt (1550–1069 BC) (Littauer and Crouwel 1985; James 1974; Herold 2006), with the rest of the information on the Near Eastern chariots coming in other forms. Two chariots and the wheels of a third were also found in the Lchashen Cemetery in Armenia (Yesayan 1960), dated to 1400–1300 BC (Pogrebova 2003, p. 397), and bronze models of chariots were found in the burial sites of neighboring Transcaucasia (Brileva 2012). Over one hundred chariots have been discovered in Shang period tombs in China, but none dates before 1200 BC (Wu 2013). (…)
The evidence presented and analyzed here shows that horse-drawn chariots were a development of the Eurasian Steppe, they were functional and heavily used, and they indicate significant social complexity. (…)
Anthony stated that chariots were invented in the southern Ural steppes (Anthony 2009, p. 62); however, it is important to underline the fact that the Sintashta–Petrovka two-wheelers represent already-developed technology, and do not have known local prototypes. Even the earliest types of shield-shaped cheekpieces have very developed attributes and demonstrate long-term preceding evolution. Since the whole Sintashta phenomenon was likely developed not in the Urals, but elsewhere (Vinogradov 2011), chariot technology also likely developed before the year 2000 BC in the Sintashta homeland, which is the Don–Volga interfuve. The reference point might be two-wheeled carts from the Catacomb culture, the Sintashta predecessor, dated to cal. 2400–2200 BC (Korenevskiy et al. 2007, p. 111; Pustovalov 2008). These might be the prototypes for the later Sintashta–Petrovka chariot complex. (…)
However, the periods contemporaneous with the Catacomb horizon and the early phases of Sintashta are the Early Dynastic III, where the Royal Tomb yielded four-wheeled wagons, and the Third Dynasty of Ur (Woolley 1934; Anthony 2009). The summed probability of six radiocarbon samples attributed to the Early Dynastic III period is cal. 2620–2200 BC (1 sigma) and fve dates for the Third Dynasty of Ur sum up to cal. 2440–2030 BC (1 sigma) (Hassan and Robinson 1987). The absence of evidence for chariots in the Near East at this time (Izbitser 2013) contrasts with ample archaeological evidence of actual chariots in Sintashta–Petrovka sites. Hence, the Sintashta fndings cannot be reminiscent of those from the Near East, as was suggested by Jones-Bley (2000, p. 139), and Genz (2013), since the chariot complex—evidenced by representations of equid-drawn vehicles with two spoked wheels (Littauer and Crouwel 1979, 1996)—was not known there until the early second millennium BC. The classic chariot complex, or a true battle chariot drawn by horses, did not appear in the Near East until the Hittite Empire and the Kingdom of Mitanni, c. 1600–1200 BC. (…)
Thus, the chariot complex is a complicated set of technologies, skills, and resources that first emerged in the zone of the Northern Eurasian steppes before 2000 BC in the context of complex but stateless societies. (…)
In conclusion, evidence provided by the study of the development of Bronze Age vehicles allows us to state that chariots were invented in Northern Eurasia before 2000 BC. The Sintashta–Petrovka fnds represent the earliest known spoke-wheeled chariots, whose forerunners are found in the burials of the Catacomb culture. Thus, they were invented in the context of the pre-Sintashta cultures and fully developed during the Sintashta period. The connection with the Near East is not quite clear as yet; however, the chariot complex as a chariot with two spoked wheels drawn by a pair of bitted horses did not appear there until the early second millennium BC, apparently associated with speakers of Indo-European languages (Raulwing 2009). (…)
Because of the great role played by horse chariots in the social and historical processes of the Middle and Late Bronze Age, the Sintashta–Petrovka chariot complex became a highly important feature of mortuary practices. The competition between collectives of military elites for resources, power and prestige brought to life the earliest horse-drawn chariots in the world.”
‘Eurasian Steppe Chariots and Social Complexity During the Bronze Age’ (Chechushkov and Epimakhov, 2018)
^ Catacomb culture two-wheeled cart
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