Abstract
The article deals with the economic aspect of the ethnic-cultural characteristics of settlements of the VI–III centuries BC, belonged to the Scythoid and Gorodets cultures. The landscape features of the Don basin have been considered, that led to the location structure of hillforts and settlements in the forested valleys of the main rivers of the region. While the steppe interfluves remained unpopulated during that period. Information on specialized tools for soil cultivation and harvesting has been systematized. A set of cultivated and weed plants is characterized by grain and seed prints detected on pottery. These data indicate the agricultural orientation of economic systems in both settled communities of the region. The population of the Scythoid culture was engaged in plow farming, the Gorodets one – in mainly slash. Agricultural needs explain the development of the first typical forest-steppe southern territories, the second – more wooded northern ones.