Miklós Kásler - Zoltán Szentirmay (szerk.): Identifying the Árpád Dynasty Skeletons Interred in the Matthias Church. Applying data from historical, archaeological, anthropological, radiological, morphological, radiocarbon dating and genetic research (Budapest, 2021)
CHAPTER THREE – Archaeological, anthropological and radiological data
Before the royal couple was interred at the Matthias Church, an anthropological examination took place. The following was written about the remains found in the first grave, that of Queen Anne of Antioch: “judging from the position of the collarbones, thorax, pelvis and thigh bones, it is a female skeleton. And since the cranial sutures are all clearly visible, the teeth are all there in good condition, and are not very worn, the womans age may have been between 30 and 40.” As for Béla III, resting in the second grave, his skull’s “sutures, with the exception of the lambda, which had started to agglutinate, can be seen clearly; the teeth are all there, but the enamel had worn off the top of the crowns, pointing to an age of around 50.” Besides the royal graves, Érdy excavated three additional graves. The third grave was located in the vicinity of the royal grave, to the south, and was about 40 centimetres deeper (earlier burial). Érdy wrote the following about this in the inventory book of the National Museum for the year 1848, under Number 64: (Éry 2008, 17): “Below the ground, we found a tomb made of carved sandstone... its bottom was missing, since it was placed on carved stones anyway, stones which were put on piles or poles that were stuck into the black, marshy soil.” A “skeleton muddied on the left lay” in the grave, which, according to the examination was “a male skeleton, according to the above criteria, over the age of 30” (current skeleton number II/52_3). The grave had already been disturbed and contained no grave goods that would suggest a king, so these may have been taken out during the Árpád era. If it was a royal grave, it may have been one of Hungary’s Kings from the 12th century. The fourth grave unearthed by Érdy may have been around the same age as that of Béla III: it was situated in the vicinity, contained 65
