Janus Pannonius Múzeum Évkönyve 13 (1968) (Pécs, 1971)

Régészet - Kralovánszky, Alán: The Paleosociographical Reconstruction of the Eleventh Century Population of Kérpuszta. Methodological Study

PALAEOSOCIOGRAPHICAL RECONSTRUCTION 79 3. The situation of the graves with coins. Kérpuszta. mably the southern part (in the following: section I) is earlier, i.e. prior to St. Stephen, since there was no current money of Hungarian impression. This suggestion is supported by several archaeological phenomena (a rarer burial; the lower level of the slope) and by the finds (the majority of plain rings, knives, strike-alights, beads, S-shaped rings of an early type, etc.). No phenomenon or find is noticed in the cemetery which would induce us to conclude on a preconceived plan of burial. We are faced by an entirely continuous inhumation, proceeding from the South to the North. In the northern part, dated by coins (in the following: section II) we may observe that at the end of the burying period the graves turn back from the East, or new burials take place, respectively (see a grave dated by a coin of St. Ladislas). Since the graves which allow a dating by coins and those lacking coins have been uncovered on different sites, the two sections may be distinguished. The boundary line between the two sections, marked by graves 87, 58, 40, 276, 307 and 369, has been drawn somewhat subjectively (Fig. 3). There is some objective reason, however, for drawing a line of partition, necessary to our analysis. North of this line the graves are denser and those having coins are found here exclusively. South of this line the graves are rarer and coin is not found in them. A break of the dividing line in an obtuse angle turned northwards is not only a consequence of the mentioned reasons, it marks or symbolizes the direction of the impopulation of the cemetery at the same time. Szőke has reached a similar result for similar reasons earlier, and we agree with him (We have changed the boundary line, drawn by Szőke through graves 65, 68 and 368, because grave 58, containing a coin, falls into this line exactly, though this circumstance is typical of the second section already).

и The number of dead buried in the two sections, distinguished in the said manner, is the following: section I == 87; section II = 318. In the following we shall proceed from the certain towards the uncertain. Therefore, on one hand, we shall investigate section II, characterized by coins, and we shall draw consequences to the date of the chronologically uncertain section I from the observations made on the former. On the other hand, we shall analyze the actually deceased on the basis of the supposition that those buried in the later sections were the immediate and continuous descendants of the persons buried in the first section. We suppose further that people were buried in the cemetery in an essentially identical proportion in both sections, i.e. no deceased persons were brought to a different cemetery. Therefore, if we succeed in deffining the time limits of section II in absolute dates of years, then we shall be able to fix the time limits of section I, consequently the full period of its use, on the basis of the laws of demography. Unfortunately archaeological research is wont to define the time limits of burial by archaeological and historical data alone in each case, disregarding biological data and the rules of demography. This is why definitions are 15 Szőke, 1953, 297.