Weiner Mihályné szerk.: Az Iparművészeti Múzeum Évkönyvei 6. (Budapest, 1963)
HOPP FERENC MÚZEUM - MUSÉE FERENC HOPP - Ferenczy, László: Daghestan Bronze Cauldrons
The earliest known reference to the manufacture of arms at Kubachi dates from the sixth century. The Persians got acquainted with them in the sixth and seventh centuries, during the construction of the large fortress at Derbent. Arms and mails expertly wrought by the Kubachi armourers were eagerly purchased by the Persians and later by the Arabs. The branches of metallurgy active in the seventh century have been enumerated in the ,,History of Albania" by the Albanian historian, Moses Kalankatvaci. 17 In the sixth and the seventh, centuries several centres of metallurgy were operating in Albania. It is difficult, however, to locate all of them, since their products were not unearthed during excavations but found in houses, preserved by the local population. At any rate the most important centres of metallurgy were in the region of Kubachi among the Darghins and in the neighbourhood of the village of Gocatl, among the Avars, both in the Daghestan mountains. 18 As to Kubachi we know that its inhabitants paid taxes to the Persians in the sixth and to the Arabs in the seventh century; besides they enjoyed relative independence. Alluding to the mails, the Persians called the Kubachi people ,,Zirehgeran" (armourers). They applied the name ,,ogbuh", i. e. Albanians, to themselves. According to Orbeli, originally they constituted one of the Albanian tribes, and were later pushed to the mountains of Southern Daghestan. 19 In the following centuries they are mentioned by Arabic sources several times. In the tenth century Mas'üdi calls the „Zirehgeran" people an independent one. However, other authors regard them as tributaries of the neighbouring cities. Al Istakhri, then in the middle of the 12th century Andalusi wrote that they paid taxes to Derbent and Baku. Among the objects manufactured by the Kubachi metalworkers he enumerates cuirasses, helmets, swords, bows, knives, daggers and various vessels of metal. The notes of Moses Kalankatvaci regarding the events connected with the appearance of the Khazars are extremely valuable. On learning of the approach of the Khazars, the local population fled to the high mountain regions. The Khazars regarded Albania as a subdued territory; in 629 A. D. the Khazar halcan, the ,,Ruler of the North", sent tax-collectors to the country to levy a tax on the population according to registers established earlier under the rule of Khosrou Anushirvan. The gathering of the amounts due from craftsmen was entrusted to tax-collectors familiar with mining and metallurgy. Khazar nobles also received metal vessels as presents. 20 These data support the belief that local metallurgy might have influenced the art of the Khazars and also that of other peoples living in the region of the Southern Prussian steppe. Literary sources reveal that in the 10th to 14th centuries, the main occupation of the Kubachi metal-founders w r as the production of arms ; it was at the same place that the casting of „Albánián" cauldrons gained the most ground between the 12th and 14th centuries. Kubachi succeeded in preserving its extraordinary role in metallurgy throughout the Middle Ages ; it is also known that up to the present day it continues its unimpaired artistic traditions in this respect. The masters of the individual villages of Daghestan specialized in a particular branch of industrial art. Those of the southern areas made e. g., pile carpets, while those of the northern territories manufactured w y oven ones. The Avars produced simple, cheap weapons; the Darghins richly ornamented ones. The Avars provided all Daghestan with engraved copper vessels, the Kubachi people with cast bronze cauldrons and lamps. But the population
