Agria 39. (Az Egri Múzeum Évkönyve - Annales Musei Agriensis, 2003)
Domboróczki László: Radiokarbon adatok Heves megye újkőkori régészeti lelőhelyeiről
period. 55 In the work produced in 1995, E. Hertelendi and his fellow authors established the exact length of the entire ALP period as a whole by means of С 14 results using data with a 68.3% probability and sigma 1 confidence interval. On the basis of this the 5330-4940BC interval became the accepted date for the ALP Culture. 56 Perhaps it would have been wiser in this case to put the sigma 2 interval agglomeration data onto a map, enabling the density readings to establish the beginning, the heyday and the end of the cultures, as can be seen in the other diagram they published showing how the curves of the three phases of the Neolithic period relate to one another. 57 That individual cultures overlapped each other chronologically seems more likely than one culture suddenly developing from another one as a result of rapid and radical change. From the middle of the decade many studies addressed the development of the ALP Culture and its relationship with the Neolithisation of the northern part of the Alföld (The Great Hungarian Plain), the links between ALP and the Körös Cultures, and possible Mezolithic precedents. They are topics which continue to provoke much discussion. 58 The debates connected with the northern limits of the Körös Culture, the development and the spread of the ALP Culture and questions relating to the transitional MezolithicNeolithic period, although very important at the time, did not produce dating of a more precise nature. We will be returning to these topics in due course, but for the time being we will continue to focus on attempts at producing absolute datings, whilst looking at the data and discussions which have emerged in the meantime. Up until the mid-1990s a lot of С 14 data in Central Europe was gathered from sites which were geographically adjacent to the ALP areas and with them, contemporary namely the sites of the TLP and Vinca Cultures. More recently this also applied to the early Neolithic Starcevo and Körös Cultures as well. 59 In addition to the publication Radiocarbon, rapidly increasing amounts of data and ever more accurate calibration curves can now be followed on the Internet 60 with the result that in certain areas we are getting a more accurate picture of the Neolithisation process and consequently a more thorough understanding of the cultural changes which went on. In the meantime it has become clear that those site datings based on С 14 sequences provide the most accurate and the most reliable chronological reference points, 61 the verification for which nevertheless require clarification through the inclusion of typological and stratigraphical data. In the region under investigation, eastern Hungary, and more specifically the area on the northern rim of the Alföld, we had relatively few radiocarbon measurements at our 55 HERTELENDI Ede ET AL. 1995. 239-244., HERTELENDI Ede ET AL. 1998. 659-665. 56 HERTELENDI Ede ET AL. 1995. 241. 57 HERTELENDI Ede ET AL. 1995. 242. 58 KERTÉSZ Róbert ET AL. 1994., MAKKAY János 1996., SÜMEGI Pál-KERTÉSZ Róbert 1998., KERTÉSZ Róbert-SÜMEGI Pál 1999a., KERTÉSZ Róbert-SÜMEGI Pál 1999b., KERTÉSZ Róbert-SÜMEGI Pál 2001a., KERTÉSZ Róbert-SÜMEGI Pál 2001b., MAKKAY János 2001. 59 For the TLP territories R. Gläser (GLÄSER, Roland 1991.) and E. Lenneis and P. Stadler (LENNEIS, Eva-STADLER, Peter 1995.) and for the territories of the Vinca Culture W. Schier (SCHIER, Wolfram 1996.) and R. Gläser (GLÄSER, Roland 1996.) whose summaries deserve a mention. For the Körös-Starcevo context the most recent work is by A. Whittle and his fellow authors (WHITTLE, Alasdair ET. AL. 2002.) who produce some C14 series. 60 LENNEIS, Eva-STADLER, Peter 1995. 12. note 17. (as yet unchecked by us). 61 WHITTLE, Alasdair ET AL. 2002. 93. 23
