Alba Regia. Annales Musei Stephani Regis. – Alba Regia. Az István Király Múzeum Évkönyve. 4.-5. 1963-1964 – Szent István Király Múzeum közleményei: C sorozat (1965)
Tanulmányok – Abhandlungen - Bóna István: The Peoples of Southern Origin of the Early Bronze Age in Hungary I–II. IV–V, 1963–64. p. 17–63. t. I–XVII.
The Peoples oi Southern Origin of the Early Bronze Age in Hungary I-II In course of the publication of the grave finds of the Nagyrév culture, extended along the middle stretches of the Danube and the Tisza in the Early Bronze Age, delineating the territorial and chronological groups of this culture, 1 I referred at several occassions to two archaeological units which established a fruitful connexion with the same: the Qbéba-Pitvaros and the Somogyvár-Gönyű groups. In our archaeological literature both groups are practically unknown, their material is unpublished yet. Although both groups are dealt with by a short, thesis-like summary so far, 2 their importance is borne out by the frequent references to their finds in modern works dealing with our Early Bronze Age. Leaving the material of these groups unpublished would thus hinder further researches. As regards the origin of the single cultures and groups and also as to their relative and absolute chronology the most recent Hungarian research on the Early Bronze Age 3 has radically modified or discarted the Tenets and methods of research made in the 1930-s and 1940-s. The theses of the latter were based on the formal comparison of some types of vases, neglecting the unpublished copious finds at hand. Although 1. The Pitvaros cemetery has been uncovered by F. Móra, its finds were described by J. Banner for the first time. In his great comprehensive work 4 he describes the Bronze Age cemeteries in the surroundings of Szeged, containing several hundred graves, excavated in the course of only four or five years at that time (Szőreg, Deszk A and F, etc.). Faced by fundamental chronological difficulties, the researches of those days could not notice the essential difference between the Pitvaros, Óbéba cemeteries and those of Szőreg type yet. Then, nay up to our day, their distinction was the less possible as the cemeteries of the Pitvaros type show identical rites with the Szőreg ones. 1 I. BONA: Alba Regia 1 (1960) 7-15, 2-3 (1962) 11-23. 2 DisF. Arch. 2 (1960) 49-51. Id., AUSBSH 3 (1961) 7-9. 3 Ibid, and N. KALICZ: Diss. Arch. 4 (1962) 1-23. The two papers are the summaries of the following manuscript monographs: I. BONA: The Middle Bronze Age in Hunrecer/t publications were enabled to give a fundamentally new system by the collection of the finds already, their detailed treatment became indispensable in order to solve the growing number of problems. While N. Kalicz set to work in dealing with the groups of eastern origin or impact, the author of the present paper chose to review those of southern origin or character. After the already published Nagyrév cemeteries and the Pitvaros and Somogyvár groups to be reviewed now, two large groups of finds remain to be published in this field: the more than one hundred Nagyrév graves unearthed in the area of Dunaújváros in the last decade and the material of the Nagyrév settlements situated along the Tisza and the Danube. Some smaller but significant groups, such as the ,,Gyula group" appering in the south-eastern part of the countury, along the Sebes-Körös, mainly near Békéscsaba and Gyuia, a group being in close relation with the Glina ill one, further a small special group lying between Budapest and the Danube bend, will be published later. Only after the accomplishment of these tasks shall we be able to give a comprehensive ned valuation of the history of the Early Bronze Age in Hungary. they have numerous bronze products and other jewels in common, further the types of vessels (in the first place the bowl forms) are the same. One more reason obscuring the divergences is that the cemeteries of the Szőreg type have been dealt with in the meantime, while the Pitvaros group will be treated in the following pages only. According to J. Banner's work the Pitvaros and the Óbéba cemeteries are fitting into the group of Szőreg cemeteries of the Perjámos culture, to the earliest period (dated as Reinecke I at that time) of the same. 5 In the typological tables of the finds derived from the Bronze Age cemeteries of the Maros region the actual gary (1958, in Hungarian) and N. KALICZ: The EarlyBronze Age in North-Eastern Hungary (1961, in Hungarian). 4 Dolg. 7 (1931) 26-28. 5 Ibid. 43. I. THE PITVAROS GROUP 17
