Liszka József (szerk.): Az Etnológiai Központ Évkönyve 2000-2001 - Acta Ethnologica Danubiana 2-3. (Dunaszerdahely-Komárom, 2001)

1. Tanulmányok - Borsos Balázs: A magyar nyelvterület számítógép segítségével meghatározott kulturális régiói

ry, and we can define groups of settlements in a more or less hierarchical order as regards their cultural character. It means that we can also analyse the cultural similarity of settlements, as the later a cluster is divided into smaller clusters, the more similar the cultural characters of settlements forming that cluster are. In the following presentation of this preliminary analysis I intend to show these characteristics of the defined cultural regions as well.

Table 1 shows the value of variance in the first 80 steps of cluster analysis.3 We can see that at some steps the value of variance increases dramatically, while at other steps the increase is only slightly recognisable. As the number of clusters and so the regional distribution of settlements is more characteristic at steps with a dramatic increase in the value of variance, we can analyse the clusters formed at these steps, i.e. with 6, 9, 10, 12, 20, 27 and 68 clusters. Basically the first 5 steps and the middle phase of this analysis at step 40 are worth looking at.

In the first map we can see the net of co-ordinates and all the settlements that form only one cluster. When two clusters are formed (Map 2) the increase (or as we go backwards in our analysis, the decrease) of value is not significant, so it does not mean a very typical distribution. Still it is quite obvious that the settlements of Transylvania form a separate cluster owing to their long historical independence and late progress.

Three clusters can be said to be typical (Map 3), as between steps two and three the value suffers a significant decrease. The territory is clearly divided into three regions, Transdanubia (or better to say West-Hungary) (-), Mid-Hungary (X) and Transylvania (+); the borderlines between them run clearly from north to south. The border between the western and the middle part goes along the Danube as far as the Danube Bend, with a few exceptions. The villages of Sárköz in Tolna county (Bogyiszló, Decs, Madocsa) are parts of the cluster of Mid- Hungary. Some further investigation is needed to find out the reason for this, but it may show, that in this area, where Bertalan Andrásfalvy described a flourishing flood-plain economy in the 17-18th century, the Danube does not mark as significant a border as elsewhere (Andrásfalvy 1975; Bárth 1974, 292). The clear north-south border in the north of the Danube Bend runs along the River Ipoly, but villages on the left bank including Kosd near Vác belong to West-Hungary. This distribution also shows that the direction of innovation is from west to east.

The most dramatic decrease of value in the whole process happens between steps three and four: the fourth value (6,83) is about half of the third value (13,51). Now at this point four clusters are formed (Map 4). Mid-Hungary is divided into two parts. These four clusters must be viewed as the most typical regional distribution of Hungarian folk culture. And these four main parts correlate quite well with the regional distribution determined by geographical, historical, linguistic and ethnographical investigations. In his book, László Kosa (1998) analyses the regional distribution of Hungarian folk culture also by ordering it into four main groups: Transdanubia (-), the Highlands (X), the Great Plains (+) and Transylvania (@). But there are also some discordances between the picture defined by traditional methods and the one drawn by the computer. The main difference is that the north-eastern part of the Plains is traditionally considered as part of the Plains but the computer finds that according to the cul-3 The computer had counted it to six decimal points, but in order to get a clearer view, to 40 steps I have simplified them to two points, and after it to three points.

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