Liska András - Szatmári Imre: Sötét idők rejtélyei. 6-11. századi régészeti emlékek a Kárpát-medencében és környékén - Tempora Obscura 3. (Békéscsaba, 2012)
Bede Ilona: Horse in the Late Avarian society of the Carpathian Basin
ILONA BEDE HORSE IN THE LATE AVARIAN SOCIETY OF THE CARPATHIAN BASIN (Summary) Horses were buried together with the dead relatively frequently during the whole period of the Avarian Age. This custom goes back to nomadic traditions, but in the Late Avarian Age, after almost 150 years of settled way of life, it is a question what kind of ideas remained behind this rite. We think that „gestes” made in the course of the burial rite left traces that can be studied after a thorough archaeological examination. By the reconstruction of the burial process we can find the representations of community’s ideas and social structure. In connection with horse and horseman burials I elaborated a method of examination with the help of which we can analyse the horse as if it had been the main actor of the burial, but at the same time as if the „grave-good” formed in the process of the rite. 1 also compare its burial rite with that of other animals. As a test, I made the first comparative study in the case of 217 graves of 6 cemeteries. As a result, the well-known image of the general Late Avarian horse and horseman burial could be observed, but also several individual features and differences. Almost in all of the cemeteries, there was some characteristic burial rite connected with the horse that was relatively regular and fit into the usual system of the cemetery. With the help of the types of objects we can separate different economic and social layers within the six cemeteries. Horse was a „separating symbol” in each of them. It is still a question why did not every „rich” grave have a horse. Thus, for the time being we cannot speak about vertical social structure. Bede Ilona Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne UMR 8167 Orient & Méditerranée 87 rue de Rivoli - 75001 Párizs 7625 Pécs - Hunyadi János u. 22. ilona.bede@univ-parisl.fr ilonabede@yahoo.fr------- A LÓ HELYE A KÉSŐI AVAR TÁRSADALOMBAN A KÁRPÁT-MEDENCÉBEN ------223
