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

opininion S. Morintz and P. Roman criticize Berciu's method not without any foundation in this very respect. (The cultural situation of Ceamurlia de Jos's ochregrave is not exactly determined.)

20 We must remark that the stele of the grave discussed here is according to the analogies discovered between the Dnester and the Danube represent a later period following the Usatovo phase.

21 The furniture of the Casimcea grave in on the other hand, partly an analogy of the flint implements discovered by Bodianski in the already mentioned graves of the cemetery in Petro-Svistunovo

22

, affirming the opinion of Merpert and Vladimir Dumitrescu; that is it supports the dating of the grave to an early period by all means preceding the Usatovo, and most probably to the period Cucuten A

—B.

23 As we have mentioned it above, the nearest analogies of the graves in Marosdécse can be found in the first place among the burial places of the Srednij Stog II, respectively amond the graves of its later period being connected to the early PitGrave Culture (Yamnaya Culture). Relying upon these findings we can risk the assumption that the ochre-grave of Kainari and Casimcea and the "Sceptrums" as well as the graves of Marosdécse and Csongrád can be connected uniformly to the phase Sredni Stog II

—Tripolye ВI

—II

—Cucuten A

—

В

—Bodrogkeresztúr (earliest); perhapst hey represent a homogeneous horizon within this.

24 It can be supposed that the complex represented by this cemetery and that of Marosdécse is the result of the earliest steppe influences as well as of the penetration of certain steppe groups. These groups could be people of the steppe population characterized by the material of Sredni Stog II, and flourishing at the period of Tripolye В I

—II, who manifested a strong relationship with the Yamnaya culture.

25 As for the historical circumstances of the penetration it is especially the opinion of Bibikova and Merpert that reserves special attention. It is a positive fact that corresponding partly the climatic and geographical conditions a cultural area was emerging in the East-European steppe in the earliest times definitely defferring from the complex represented by the Gumelnita, Bojan, Tripolye, Tiszapolgár, etc. cultures of the "Danubian Circle". This eastern area is the most sharply represented 20 Morintz, S.

—

Roman, P., Über die Übergangsperiode vom Aeneolithikum zur Bronzezeit in Rumänien. Symposium über die Entstehung und Chronologie der Badener Kultur. Nitra 1969. Lithographed text. 31. 21 Berciu, D., op. cit., Rumania before Burebista 74—75. Шмаглий H. M.

—Черняков И. T., Курганы степной части между Дуная и Днестра. Материали по археологии северного Причерноморья. 6. Одесса 1970. 100—102. 22 Popescu, D., op. cit.; Бодянский О. В., op. cit. Археолопя. XX. Ю'ев 1968. 118. fig 4., ill. 4 а 6. 23 Dumitrescu, V., op. cit. Dacia N. S. I. 1957. 89—95. Мерперт H. Я., Древнейшая история населения степной полосы Восточной Европы. Ph. D. thesis. Москва 1968. 75—81. See also: Garasanin op. cit. 25. According to the informations of Marija Gimbutas in West-Ukraine in the region of the South-Bug a sceptrum was discovered with Tripolje В I (!) material. (Gimbutas marks this phase Kurgan I and Kurgan II and places a part of the pit-grave kurgans of Rumania and East-Hungary including the cemetery of Marosdécse with it. Neither the kurgan-stratigraphies nor finds support this assumpion, moreover, they contradict it. (ср.: Gimbutas, M., ProtoIndo-European Culture: The Kurgan Culture during the Fifth, Fourth and Third Millenium В. C. Indo European and Indo-Europeans. Philadelphia 1970. 178—179. and 195. note 6. (with further literature.) 24 On the basis of the torques found in the grave discovered near Kainari — and other above mentioned analogies it appears that the torques of Marosdécse does not justify the dating of the cemetery to a date later than the period of the Bodrogkeresztúr culture. By reason of the facts mentioned above we assume that the cemetery was used between the transitional period of Tiszapolgár— Bodrogkeresztúr and the final period of the Bodrogkeresztúr culture, (see note 5.) 28 ср. Mepnepm. op. cit.; Мовща

—Чеботаренко, op. cit. 49. Мерперт op. cit. ibid. 15