Folia archeologica 23.

Fodor István: Újabb adatok a bánkúti sír értékeléséhez

FURTHER DATA TO THE EVALUATION OF THE BÁNKÜT GRAVE The Bánkút grave was unearthed in 1931 and the grave goods subsequently published in Hungarian and German by J. Banner.

2 The find ( Figs. 1-2), being unparalleled among the archaeological material of Hungary, was placed at that time between very large time limits (10th to 14th century) and there were but scarce data for the ethnical classification of the deceased person. The aim of this paper is to make an attempt for answering to these questions based on recently discovered analogies from East Europe and Asia. Stirrups and horse-bit are to be dated on the basis of East European analogies to the I3th-i4th century.

67 The nearest parallel for the torques is one found in the hoard of Vladimir, hidden before the Mongols ( Fig. j

) ;

9 the two pieces were probably made at the same time, i.e. in the second half of the XII or in the early 13th century. Analogues pieces to the bronze mirror of Bánkút, as shown by J. Banner, were to be dated also between very large limits (8th to 14th century). The following recent analogies make this dating more exact and are able to locate the mirror of Bánkút as well. An exact double of the mirror, of the same measures, made in the same mould, is known from China {Fig. 4)

1

6 to be dated to the Sung period. The handle was probably inlaid with bone. A very near piece to the above tines is a mirror of the Suchan hoard (Fig. 6),

1

8 a Djurchen product, which is to be dated consequently between 1115 and 1215. This is the approximate date of production of our Bánkút mirror as well as of its double from China. A similar mirror was found in a female grave from the environment of Pavlodar (East Kazahstan), to be dated to the 13th-i4th century (Fig. 7).

21-2

2 This latter is in our opinion not a Chinese original but an imitation. The mirrors with fish design known from East Europe are indicated in museum inventories without exception as stray finds. There are some Chinese originals (Biliar

—Fig. 9) as well as copies (Bolgari—Fig. 8; Novii Sarai

—Fig. 10; Kiev Museum, find place unknown

—Fig. 11) among them. These mirrors are dated with certainty to the second half of the 13th, resp. to the 14th century.

2

9 The first mirrors with fish design were brought in all probability by the Mongol conquerors to East Europe, where there was made a quantity of copies by the bronze workers of the Golden Horde. The symbol of the two fishes, taken over previously from the Chinese,

1

5 might have been brought also by the Mongols to this area, where it became very popular (it occurs on coins of the Golden Horde Period as well).

3

0 The objects of the Bánkút find are in their bulk to be dated consequently to the second half of the 13th century or to the 14th century; the mirror was made in China in the 12th or in the early 13th century.