Alba Regia. Annales Musei Stephani Regis. – Alba Regia. Az István Király Múzeum Évkönyve. 4.-5. 1963-1964 – Szent István Király Múzeum közleményei: C sorozat (1965)

Tanulmányok – Abhandlungen - Bóna István: The Peoples of Southern Origin of the Early Bronze Age in Hungary I–II. IV–V, 1963–64. p. 17–63. t. I–XVII.

bones as grave-goods only once. However, both reports written on the excavations

16 agree in the statement that the bowls found in the graves contained bones of pigs orfowlasa rule. This information is corroborated also by the only photograph of the excavations we have (PL I no. 14). The documents on the excavations in the Pitvaros cemetery are rather defective. Since they were hasty rescue excavations, no map or sketch was made on the situation of the graves, and the notes taken on each of them are rather laconic. Nevertheless one can enunciate the most important data. In spite of the numerous data referring to devastations we cannot think of contemporary, Early Bronze Age body-snatching or disturbing in the cemetery. A part of the damages is due to burials and pits dug in the age of migrations, another to the production af sand the time of the excavations, though the latter are rarely specified in the notes. The 37 graves enabling us to evaluate their data contained the skeletons of 30 adults and 7 children. The shape of the grave-pits remained unnoticed, their size varied between 90—100 x 140—170 cm according to the contraction. The maximum depth of a grave was 200 cm, the minimum 40 cm. The 106 cm average corresponds to the majority of the graves. On the testimony of the available 23 data the deceased have been contracted lying on their right in 13, on their left in 10 cases. Those lying on their right sides were orientated in the direction S-N or SE-NW respectively, those lying on their left sides in that of N-S or NE-SW respectively (according to the known 9 data), thus their faces were turned towards E in both cases. Only grave 30 furnished the example of a double burial. The deceased were placed inversely one above the other, their faces turned towards E equally. Of the 42 Bronze Age graves 38 yielded grave-furniture, 4 (among them a child's grave) contained merely the skeleton. Grave 25 has been a symbolic one (cenotaph). The most frequent grave-goods are vases, found in 30 graves altogether; among them the majority (24 cases) are bowls. In the remaining 6 graves only jugs came to light, mostly 2 or 3 pieces together. Though not numerically, a very characteristic type of vessel of our cemetery is the two-handled mug, represented in 15 instances. According to the data the bowls contained bones of pigs and fowl usually. Golden lock-rings were found in 3 graves (11, 27, 36), the latter three are deep ones. The diary mentions a gold scale, perhaps a 16 ,,Pesti Hírlap" 7. sept. 1926 and ,,Délmagyarország" 8. Sept. 1926. round ornament fastened to the costume, in grave 24. Compared to the conditions of the Early Bronze Age in Hungary, the cemetery was rich in bronze; such objects were found in 11 graves altogether and the notes of the excavations mention bronze in two more. A diadem made of Panpipe-like double tubes was found in graves 20 and 37, rolled bracelets or pairs of bracelets respectively in graves 2, 12, 15, 37, 47 and 49, ,,Cypriot" pins and their fragments in graves 8 and 47, a spectacle-shaped spiral pendant in grave 9, a small dagger in grave 7, an awl or a pin in grave 24. Beside the bronze objects containing a small amount of tin bone eyelet pins made of birds' tibiae, serving to fasten the costume, are also frequent (graves 10, 19, 28, 41, 42). Ten graves yielded necklaces containing fayence beads (7, 15, 16, 18, 24, 27, 31, 37, 40, 43), they were the resting places of women and female children in all probability. Pendants made of animal teeth were found in two graves (34, 42). Grave 31 is conspicuous for the bunch of red paint, mentioned in the description of the grave. Óbéba — Beba Veche (former Torontál county, now Timis-Torontál, Rumanian People's Republic). The first finds of the cemetery have come to light in course of the construction of the highroad Óbéba — Kiszombor in 1902, at a distance of cca 3 km from the village. Informed on the graves in 1903, the director of the Szeged Museum, J. Reizner visited the site and learned from the worker, having discovered it, that the ditch of the road has crossed some 10 graves by then. He remembered to have seen grave-goods only in one of them (grave A). In the fresh earth.of the roadside ditch the traces of further graves became visible, so J. Reizner, accompained by. A. Török, made a test excavation in the area on the 17th and 18 th July 1903. The cemetery lay on the side of a low mound, carried down in the judgment of J. Reizner; here, at the depth of 30—40 cm two additional skeletons (graves 1—2) have come to light at this occasion. J. Reizner reported on his test excavation in the periodical Archaeologiai Értesítő.

17 On the 14th — 16th September of the same year he went on with the uncovering, accompanied by A. Török; in these days he succeeded in excavating 14 additional graves (graves 3—16). He was prevented by his death from their publication, the report on the second excavation has been written by his successor, I. Tömörkény.

18 However, I. Tömörkény 17 Arch. Ért. 24 (1904) 82-88. 18 Arch. Ért. 25 (1905) 255-257.