Achaeometrical Research in Hungary II., 1988

PROSPECTING and DATING - Balázs ERDÉLYI: Data to the chronology of the history of a settlement: thermoluminescent dating of Tapolca chuchill

Balázs ERDÉLYI DATA TO THE CHRONOLOGY OF THE HISTORY OF A SETTLEMENT: THERMOLUMINESCENT DATING OF TAPOLCA CHURCHILL Abstract: Since 1984, excavation at Tapolca - Churchill have uncovered forgotten monuments of the town's history. Nevertheless , there are still has many unanswered questions due to insufficiency of historical sources. Using methods of archaeometry, some of these questions can be answered more precisely. Therefore we decided to perform the TL-dating of artefacts, fragments and materials from the TapolcaChurchill excavation. Results concerning the neolithic material (Samples 8 and 9) have already been published. Sample 7 (the so-called neolithic „ Tapolca granary") was impossible to evaluate. This paper presents results concerning Samples I to 6. The results also propound some new and interesting questions relevant to the historical chronology of the Tapolca-Hill. Antecendents of Testing During the course of excavations that have taken place since 1984, altogether 9 burnt terracotta samples, suitable for thermoluminescent dating, were recovered in 1986-87. These samples represent the excavation's entire territory. We could extract samples from several excavation features whose typochronological dating was impossible or accidental due to the lack or mixed nature of the findings. Samples were taken from the two lime-pits (circular deep pits, engraved into the bedrock), from the foundation walls that start unusually deeply (and which hold the walls of the present-day school-building) and from the wall as well as destruction layers of the palace building that was subsequently discovered. Sample 1 was taken from a brick that had been found in the lowest row of the eastern inner wall of the so-called „palace", at a part which was located north of the cellarentrance (its depth was -267 cm-s from the surface). Sample 2 is a brick built-in presumably secondarily, found at the southern entrance of the school in the deep foundation. It was unusual to find this „single" brick in the foundation thathad been built mainly from broken stones during seventies of the 19

th century. The shape, dimensions and the material of the brick looked old. The reason why the foundations of the school-building were laid so deeply in an area that otherwise hat provided a comparatively smooth floor level needs additional investigations. Perhaps one may presume the existence of a „cellar" here as is the case with the „palace" built on nearly the same floor level. Sample 3 is derived from the burnt loamed-clay deposit of the southern (No. 1) limepit from below the thick layer of lime. Sample 4 was from the fraction of the thoroughly burnt, loam clay walking surface found in Square 13 at depth of-290 cm. We extracted Sample 5 from the heavily burnt through loam clay of the cellar's floor found in the so-called „palace", not far from the find spot of Sample 1. The heavy burning, related to destruction, can be presumably brought into connection with the collapsed wooden-ceiling section found during the course of the 1989 excavations. It was located on the cellar-floor, in the vicinity of the western-corner where the marks of the crossbeams covered with plank-spreading were clearly observable. 57