Folia archeologica 24.

Tibor Kovács: Representations of Weapons on Bronze Age Pottery

REPRESENTATIONS OF WEAPONS ON BRONZE AGE POTTERY TIBOR KOVÁCS A few lucky finds of the past years enriching the source material at our disposal enable us to investigate the descriptive art of the Bronze Age population of Hungary in a more comprehensive way than it was possible in the past. As far we are still working on detail problems which, however, cannot yield definite results in themselves. Investigating a group of representations of human figures resp. weapons can add, accordingly, but a mosaic stone to a full picture of the Bronze Age descriptive art. We shall deal here with two outstanding relics and some minor ones, closely connected. M

ENDE — LEÁNYVÁR In the Tápió valley, in a south-east direction to the village Mende, county Pest, lies a hilltop site, of a form approximately triangular, belonging to the Vatya culture. At the northern corner of the so-called Leányvár, towering above the surrounding terrain with 10 to 15 m, sherds of a clay jar with plastic decoration came to light in 1964. Near to the fragments found at a depth of about 2 ma number of intact pottery, mainly cups with handles, were unearthed, a part of whose contained burnt cereals. In 1966 this disturbed area together with its nearest surroundings was excavated.

1 In the disturbed soil some more fragments of the jar with plastic decoration were cleared. Jar with representation of a human figure with dagger ( Fig. 1). As for its structure it may be named an anthropomorphic vessel, where the upper part (rim and neck) can be identified with the head, while the lower part builds the body. Two knobs, situated centrally under the rim, respond, in so far our hypothesis proves right, the two eyes. Two hands in relief with incised lines for the fingers, start from the shoulder rib (Fig. 2). While the hands were formed by the potter together with the vessel, the dagger, situated near the left hand, was modelled separately and stuck to the surface consequently. The upper and lower part of the dagger hilt is decorated with five dots each; the blade with three incised lines (Fig. 3). The present reconstruction w^s made with regard to the proportions and formal varia1 Kovács, T., Arch. Ért. 94(1967) 219.