Ilon Gábor: Szombathely őskori településtörténetének vázlata (Szombathely, 2004)

Ilon Gábor However, I should not run ahead in time so fast. I only intended to highlight the substantial work completed by Vilmos Lipp and to flash a few excerpts from it. He regretfully had left the county well before the completion of his work. Therefore the research of prehistoric times in Szombathely became a neglected "stepchild" of local archaeology circa half a century ago, despite the fact that Kálmán Miske (1860-1943), museum director and researcher of Velem St. Vid Hill, was undoubtedly interested in Prehistory. For some unintelligible reasons, however, he yielded the territory of the city to builders and to those committed to the Roman Age. At the beginning of the 1940's, János Banner (1888-1971), university professor of archaeology, paid special attention to the prehistoric, principally the Pécel-Baden artifacts of Szombathely, most likely due to the Vas County origin and local museum apprenticeship of Amália Mozsolics (1910-1997). No substantial change in the approach outlined above has taken place yet. The real break-through may undoubtedly and respectfully be attributed to the name of Mária Karolyi (she worked at the local museum between 1967-1998) as well as her works completed in concern to prehistoric researches. I may sincerely state that she compiled fundamental research and published key studies including Szombathely data. The archaeological activity Gábor Bandi (1939-1988), former director, and Mária Fekete performed in respect to the city had no such a remarkable volume. Beyond question, a new era started in the records of prehistoric researches of Szombathely from the second half of the 1990's, which partly relates to the increased volume of investments and perhaps the author of these lines has also had a moderate impact on this process. As Csilla Farkas, researcher of prehistory, joined our institute, the Archaeological Department has been fortified and pays extremely special attention to Prehistorical times. On the other hand, as a member of a new generation, Péter Kiss, specialized in the Roman Age, has not refused to face the challenges arising out of the excavations conducted in concern to Prehistory. In this book, I have presented a brief outline of the results of the most recent excavations with a stress suggesting that (i) A more colorful picture of the Prehistory of the city boundaries may be depicted via future data processing; (ii) Not only one of my inaccuracies, or mistakes will be corrected certainly. Despite the above I thought it had been a proper time to complete the first and extensive thesis in respect to the ancient city of Szombathely. What are the statements, or the results of my work in brief? Let us see them in a chronological order. The scene in reflection of the most recent researches The Neolithic Age (Fig. 13) The vast migration of Vas County, including the city of Szombathely, took place during the Middle New Neolithic era at the time of the Transdanubian Line-decorated Ceramics Culture (5500 - 4700 B.C.). The Neolithic improvements were mediated by local inhabitants to West-North-West, in some cases to the Atlantic Ocean, simultaneously transporting the radiolarite raw material from the Bakony Hills and invading the stone raw material yards of Kőszeg Hill, Vas Hill, and in the so-called "Rohonci-ablak" (Rohonc-window). They started mining and made particular polished stone axes of the raw materials (e.g.: 96