Alba Regia. Annales Musei Stephani Regis. – Alba Regia. A Szent István Király Múzeum Évkönyve. 34. 2004 – Szent István Király Múzeum közleményei: C sorozat (2005)

Tanulmányok – Abhandlungen - Zalai-Gaál, István: New evidence for the Cattle cult in the Neolithic of Central Europe. XXXIV. p. 7–40. T. I–XVII.

archaeological record suggests that trophies and horns played a prominent role in these rituals. Rituals involving cattle sacrifices began with bloody sacrifices in the Early Neolithic, a practice which survived into the Copper Age, as evidenced by the skulls and horns deposited into pits. In human burials, cattle appeared as part of the food offerings deposited beside the deceased; entire cattle were only placed into graves from the Lengyel period. The use and depiction of wagons and carts can be documented from the Baalberg and Trichterbecher periods (Ganslmeier 2001, 135). Boris Jovanovic" distinguished three types of sacred places in the Late Neolithic of South-East Europe: sanctuaries with monumental altars and bucrania, domestic shrines or sacrificial places with altars created from clay combined with bucrania, and cult places with small altars and „portable" figurines (Jovanovié 1991, 119). Small animal figurines and animal depictions played a subordinate role in the cult buildings and sanctuaries of SouthEast Europe, or left no trace in the archaeological record. Of the depicted animals, only cattle appears in addition to carefully modelled anthropomorphic imagery. Christina Marangou and Lauren E. Talalay have noted that even though the species portrayed by the animal figurines cannot always be determined, most of them show bovines or horned creatures, no doubt reflecting the primacy of these species in subsistence (Marangou 1992, 163; Talalay 1993, 46). The sanctuaries uncovered at JakovoKormadin and Parta were erected in the settlement's centre, suggesting that the lack of sanctuaries on other sites may simply be attributed to the fact that the investigated area did not include the central areas at these sites (Jovanovic 1991, 119, Abb. 1, Abb. 2, the reconstruction of the two sanctuaries and the bucrania uncovered at Kormandin). Svetozar Stankovic believes that most of the realistically depicted animals portray bulls or oxen and accepts Jens Lüning's view that these were symbols of power, virility and fertility (Stankovic 1991, 41; Liming 2000, 11-12). Gheorghe Lazarovici has voiced a similar opinion:

34 since the Parta sanctuary was constructed under the constellation of the bull, it seems likely that this community had a rudimentary knowledge of astronomy (Lazarovici et al. 1995, 16-17).

35 It has been suggested that this imagery had a religious meaning eo ipso (Lenneis 1995, 43; Kalicz 1998; 2000), although the possibility that some of the animal portrayals served profane pur34 Similarly to several other prehistorians, Gheorghe Lazarovici has uncritically accepted some of James Mellaart's hypotheses: "Die Seltenheit der Darstellung des Stierkults im Verhältnis zu der großen Muttergottheit... zeigt uns, daß der Stierkult zu den geheimsten zählte, dessen Geheimnis der Zeugung gehütet werden mußte. Bekanntlich ist der Stier ein Symbol der Kraft und Potenz" (Lazarovici 1989,151). 35 The astronomical knowledge of the Late Neolithic communities of Central Europe is usually addressed in connection with the circular enclosures (Pavuk-Karlovsky 2004, with further literature). poses (such as feeding vessels, toys, oil lamps, etc.) cannot be rejected out of hand (Podborsky 1982, 63; Kaufmann 1999, 338). According to Martin P. Nilsson, the bull represented the demon of the vegetation and personified the periodic renewal of vegetation in prehistoric religion (Nilsson 1967, 152-155). Marija Gimbutas regarded schematic bull horns as embodying „one of the basic philosophical ideas of Old European religion" (Gimbutas 1974, 93). Others suggested that the small horned animal figurines and the cattle depictions in sanctuaries were creatures dedicated to a deity (Wunn 2001, 129). The archaeological interpretations of fertility cults, which have since long hardened into commonplaces in prehistoric studies, are based on works by James George Frazer, Mircea Eliade, Bronislaw Malinowski and others, who drew from the 19th century ethnologic record and the myths of ancient religions. Most of the archaeological studies discussing „cult phenomena" have uncritically adopted these views without a rigorous examination of the underlying ideas and assumptions (cp. the works of James Mellaart, Marija Gimbutas, Dieter Kaufmann, Gheorghe Lazarovici, Jens Lüning, and others - the present author is no exception!). There is little evidence supporting the theory of the „fertility paradigm": the corpus of archaeological finds allows, at the most, the determination of the social and economic context of figurines and their positioning in space and time. The association of bulls with male virility is one of the more recent theories. Most of the „modern" theories concerning the origins and the meaning of the Neolithic bull cult were born following the discoveries made in Çatal Hüyük. However, it is unclear why James Mellaart, who has an excellent knowledge of the religions of the Ancient Near East, described the cattle depicted in Çatal Hüyük as bulls and why he associated them with a male deity (Röder-Hummel-Kunz 1996; Mellaart 1967, 200-204). The sex of the animals appearing in the so-called „Hunting scene" cannot be determined since sexual organs are not depicted and the horns do not indicate the sex of the animals. Bovines appear in a wide range of contexts in the prehistoric and historic religions of the eastern Mediterranean and it is therefore far from obvious why the reliefs, the heads and the bucrania should be linked to a male deity. Ina Wunn has pointed out that there is nothing to support the association of cattle with the „male principle" in the Anatolian Neolithic and that the preponderance of depictions of the female principle at Çatal Hüyük can be taken to imply that the cow depictions can be linked to some sort of mother goddess.

36 It seems likely that cattle played a role in mortuary rites. Brigitte Röder, Juliane Hummel and Brigitta Kunz too agree that the animals „Darüber hinaus ist seit Çatal Hüyük die Existenz einer Urmutter bekannt... Diese Urmutter war offensichtlich eine allgemein bekannte mythische Gestalt und wurde daher gern und häufig sowohl als Relief als auch auf der Keramik dargestellt, stand aber nicht im Mittelpunkt eines nachgewiesenen Kultes" (Wunn 2001, 122). 26