Szatmári Imre: Békés megye középkori templomai (Békéscsaba, 2005)

Békés megye középkori templomai Saint Paul), four in Gyula (Chapel Saint Alexis, Saint Nicholas, Saint Maurice and the chapel consecrated to the Apostles in the forest). More than 90% of the mediaeval churches exceeding the two hundred in number could be rural temples. In the Árpád Age they were without exception one-nef buildings, with semicircular, rectangular or horseshoe-arched apse. Their length was 10-15 meters, width 68 meters, the entrance was placed on the west or south side. None of them had got a tower. Nevertheless circle temples have been also found. The spectacular increase recently in the number of horseshoe-arched temples in the Great Plain urges to re-valuate the earlier establishments regarding the spread and date of this temple-type. In case of some temples (in Décse, Kardoskút, Kamut, Nagyszénás, Sarkadkeresztúr) remnants of a foundation indicating a chancel constructed on the inner side of the west closing wall came to the surface. Most of the time foundation of rural temples were made of stamped earth or clay, the wall was laid out of bricks, occasionally placing carved profile bricks at wall-divisions. We found also traces of plastering, white-washing, even painting in various (blue, red, green, yellow, brown) colours the walls. We have got few examples of using stones, however, it cannot be regarded as a rarity. Economic boom of the late Middle Age saw extensions and reconstructions carried out in ecclesiastical buildings. During the reconstructing works, the buildings were extended on the west side, or new walls were attached to the old ones with pulling down the apse, or perhaps the nef was widened. Using supporting beams, explored in more places in the county, can be definitely evaluated as a distant wave of the European Gothicism, 159 confirming that parts of this art style reached our region as well. In the Árpád Age no corpse was buried inside the rural church, in the late mediaeval age (approx. from the beginning of the 14

th century), however, this custom was widespread. The graveyard around the small-size rural temple became full as time passed, so more layers were created in the cemeteries, then the graveyards around the temples as well, getting more and more crowded, had to be extended. The graveyards were mostly bordered by a wide ditch. More examples can be mentioned for burial customs, which can be regarded as mediaeval antecedents of ethnographic topics. E.g. the mediaeval cemetery in Décse indicated at least five types of burying. There were traditional burials with or without coffin — in case of the latter with rolling the corpse in a curtain or blanket woven out of typha. A third way of burying was when the corpse placed on various forms of Saint Michael horse was buried together with the latter, laid on typha and covered also with a case-like upside down coffin opened at the top. They buried also in the same way, but without case-like coffin. The fifth type of burying was the most popular, when the corpse was simply laid on typha and covered with a coffin opened at the bottom. Consequently, the examples we have got regarding the sacred buildings and cemeteries around the churches definitely demonstrate that the state of development of the region in the early Árpád Age was at the same level as that of other regions of the country. Architects of the clan's monasteries either came from abroad or were professionals who acquired their learning abroad, however, churches erected in smaller settlements were built by rural masters with less wide knowl-