A Móra Ferenc Múzeum Évkönyve, 1971. 2. (Szeged, 1974)

Ecsedy, István: A New Item Relating the Connections with the East in the Hungarian Copper Age

A Móra Ferenc Múzeum Évkönyve 1971/2 A NEW ITEM RELATING THE CONNECTIONS WITH THE EAST IN THE HUNGARIAN COPPER AGE (A MAROSDÉCSE-TYPE GRAVE IN CSONGRÁD)* ISTVÁN ECSEDY (Budapest, National Museum) In 1962 near Csongrád on the N-S-situated loess-ridge called Kettőshalom while excavating in a sand-pit human bones were found, round which reddish discoluaration of the sand could be traced. Getting knowledge of the discovery of the grave Katalin Nagy the archeologist of the Tornyai János Museum at Hódmezővásárhely started excavations on this territory next year. It was in the course of these excavations that the burial-place constituting the subject of our article — and left undisturbed while mining in the sand-pit — turned up.

1 The description of the grave: There was not any trace of grave discernible in the homogeneous yellow sandy soil. The shape and extension of the grave found in a depth of 178 cm was indicated by an E

—W-situated red ochre patch, in the axis of which the skeleton of the buried man placed with his head towards west was lying. The dead was lying supine in a half-sedentary position. The trunk is a little raised upwards from the waist and the head is supported; this way the dead is facing the east. The legs drawn up into a flexed position remained in their original positure. The half-sedentary position of the skeleton is pointedly shown by the fact that the feet are resting under the level of the pelvis in a small separate pit. The arms were placed along the trunk somewhat flexed in the elbow, with the hands on the hip-joint. As mentioned before, in the whole area of the grave as well as on the skeleton there was a considerable amount of red ochre. (Figs. 1 and 2.) Furniture: 1. Between the right upper arm and the ribs there was a 13,2 cm long trapezoid profiled obsidian blade lying. (Fig 3/1). 2. In the vicinity of the head and the shoulder very small perforated disk-shaped limestonebeads (Fig. 3/4). 3. Small copper-beads made of curved copperplate round the bent knees. (Fig. 3/2). 4. Near the copper-beads cylindrical, pierced beads made of spondylus-shell. (Fig. 3/3) 5. Near the left pelvis there was an ochreknob 15 cm in diameter, which must have been placed on the ochre-layer covering the bottom of the grave in a small pouch made of some organic material (leather or textile). The burial place described here was first — although only in great lines — appreciated by Gyula Gazdapusztai. Mentioning the Tiszapolgár—Bodrogkereszturcharacter of the furniture, ! he placed the grave in a summary manner among the culture of the pit-grave kurgan (Yamnaya Culture), thus, by means of the furniture he thought the relavively early appearance of the pit-grave kurgans of the Great Hungarian Plain — occurring mostly without any furniture — to be justified.

2 His standing-point seems to be grounded what refers to the characteristic laying of the * The manuscript received in 1971. 1 In this place I express my thanks to Katalin Nagy for letting the material at issue be published by me. 2

. Gazdapusztai, Gy., Die chronologische Fragen der Alfölder Gruppe der Kurgan Kultur. MFMÉ 1966—67/2 99. 9