Századok – 2006

TANULMÁNYOK - Bálint Csanád: Az ethnosz a kora középkorban. (A kutatás lehetőségei és korlátai) 277

AZ ETHNOSZ A KORA KÖZÉPKORBAN 347 seriously been questioned by recent research, but this fact is hardly reflected in the research of the middle ages in Central and Eastern Europe. Arms, clothes and hairstyle together can of course serve to distinguish different cultures living alongside each other, but more balanced opinions are hard to formulate in the case of the peoples of the steppe. In Central Europe until recently a good deal of hope was put in the ethnic relevance of the results of physical anthropology; but, on the one hand, this relevance could not be proved, while, on the other hand, the constant mixing of different ethnic groups since the most ancient times was given too little importance. The same can be said of the youngest and most promising field in the research of the origin of peoples, namely genetics; for even its experts fail to count with all those uncertainties which are trivial for historians. All the manifestations of early medieval ethnicity are therefore to be studied in Central and Eastern Europe as well, but their conceptual aspect should never be out of sight.