Folia archeologica 27.

Viola T. Dobosi: Őskori telep Demjén-Hegyeskőbércen

10 V. T. DOBOSI Mesolithic hunter groups

..." and that within this framework the Iron Gate population adapted itself to the special local circumstances.

4 There are different opinions as for the antecedents of the Neolithic Age of Hungary. There are still strong supporters of a "Tardenoisien" culture of Transdanubia, outlined merely on the basis of a few stray surface finds.

5 I should like to underline here, too, that the find material is not convincing, either quantitatively, or qualitatively, for allowing such far-reaching conclusions. With the excavation of Sződliget and drawing the main features of the Eger culture the outlines of a surviving population, from the Palaeolithic through the Early Holocene upwards, become more and more distinct.

6 The find group of northeastern Hungary, characterized by rough implements, being the archaeological heritage of a population group, loaning at first from the contemporaneous Neolithic peoples, going over subsequently probably to a food producing way of life, drew forthright the attention of the specialist researchers, studying the Alföld Linear Pottery culture. N. Kalicz and J. Makkay dealt in several papers with the Eger culture, as an immediate predecessor of the Alföld Linear Pottery culture.

7 According to the authors the sharp dividing line of the diffusion of the Körös culture (line Kunhegyes-Berettyóújfalu) has to be explained with the fact that north of this line a strong, constant (?) population was living, resisting to a Neolithisation for a certain time. This basic population would later turn to food production. It was in connection with the Körös culture (Szatmár group) and developed the Neolithic Alföld Linear Pottery culture with an independent inner evolution. While in North East Hungary the population of the Eger culture, which becomes more and more distinct, seems to have been in fact a Mesolithic basic population, producing a peculiar tool assemblage, the find material of Transdanubia, classified so far as a Mesolithic one, cannot justify us in assuming the presence of a strong Transdanubian Mesolithic population,

8 even if not brought in connection with a certain culture. Here we have to touch upon a terminological problem, considered by us as an important one. Beside a Mesolithic, food-gathering way of life (and everything connected with this: a population of small numbers, rambling permanently over large areas, in the case of the Eger culture sticking, according to our present 4 Jovanovic, В., Elements of the early Neolithic architecture in the Iron Gate Gorge and their functions. AI 9(1968) 8.; Jovanovic, В., Chronological frames of the Iron Gate group of the early Neolithic Period. AI 10(1969) 34. 5 Bruckner, В., Die tardenoisienischen Funde von "Peres" bei Hajdukovo und aus Васка Palanka und das Problem der Beziehungen zwischen dem Mesolithikum und präkeramischen Neolithikum im Donaugebiete. AI 7(1966) 1-12. Besides some other misinterpretations (e.g. the Epipaleolithic "sandige Stellen von Typ Eger-Sződliget", north of Budapest), he uses these finds as analogies basing a strict chronology on them. G Gábori, M., Arch.Ért. 83(1956) 177-182.; Vértes, L., Acta Arch.Hung. 1(1951) 153190.; Vértes, L., FA 17(1965) 9-36.; Vértes, L., Az őskőkor és az átmeneti kőkor emlékei Magyarországon. A Magyar Régészet Kézikönyve, 1. (Bp. 1965) 217-221. 7 Kalicz, N., Heves megye kő- és rézkorának fontosabb kérdései. In: Dolgozatok Heves megye múltjából. (Eger 1970) 5-14.; Ka/icN.-Makkay, ]., Probleme des frühen Neolithikums der nördlichen Tiefebene. In: Die aktuellen Fragen der Bandkeramik. 77-81.; Ka/icz, N—Makkay ]., A méhteleki agyagistenek. (Guide to the Méhtelek exhibition.) (Nyíregyháza 1974) 8 Makkay, ]., A kőkor és rézkor Fejér megyében. Fejér megye története. 1:1. (Székesfehérvár 1970)