Dr. T. Tóth szerk.: Studia historico-anthropologica (Anthropologia Hungarica 20. Budapest, 1988)

ANTHROPOLOGIA HUNG ARICA XX. 1988 l>- 55-66 Anthropological studies on an early Avar period population at Backo Petrovo Selo (Yugoslavia). Part 1: Individual metric data By K. ERY (Received April 26, 1988) Abstract: Present study gives the individual metric data of the bone remains of an Avar period population from the turn of the 6th/7th centuries. With 4 tables. MATERIAL AND METHODS The Archaeological Department of the University of Beograd has totally unearthed, under Prof. Jovan KOVAŐEVIC s leadership, a cemetery from the early Avar period at Backo Petrovo Selo (Péterréve, Vojvodina), on the banks of Csík-ér. From the 137 graves the bone remains of 100 individuals could be preserved. The archaeological and anthropological finds of the cemetery were deposited in the collection of the Municipal Museum and Gallery of Becej. The examination of the anthropological finds were carried out, upon the request of J. KOVAŐEVIC in Beáej between 1971 and 1973, while a manuscript in English language was handed in Beograd, in the spring of 1975. According to the original plans the data of the cemetery would be published in an independent volume, where the archaeological part would be written by J. KOVAÖE

VIO. the anthropological part by K. ERY, the serological analysis of the human bone remains by I. LENGYEL, the zoological remains by S. BÖKÖNYI. The Hungarian authors have handed in their studies in time, still the monograph has not been published, and we have no information even about its being prepared. The 13 years that have passed since that time, I think, provide enough justification to publish the anthropological results in the Anthropologia Hungarica. Another justification for this publication is the fact that the early Avar period population of the Carpathian Basin is yet poorly known. The cemetery on the Lower Tisza at Backo Petrovo Selo was started, according to J. KOVACEVIC's archaeological dating, at around 568, and as attested by the laboratory analyses carried out by I. LENGYEL it was used for 80 + 20 years. The first part of the study contains the individual cranial and post-cranial bone measurements of the adults. The second part will give the evaluation of the data in the next volume of the Anthropologia Hungarica. The bones were measured according to the manual of MARTIN & SALLER (1957). The cranial capacity was calculated by using the porion-bregma height. Stature was calculated according to PEARSON (1899) and that of BREITINGER (1938) and BACH (1965).