Bagi Gábor et al. (szerk.): Tisicum - A Jász-Nagykun-Szolnok Megyei Múzeumok Évkönyve 17. (Szolnok, 2008)

Régészet - Patay Pál: Régészeti kutatásaim Szolnok megyében

PAL PATAY

MY ARCHAEOLOGICAL RESEARCHES IN JÁSZ-NAGYKUN-SZOLNOK COUNTY

I worked as an archaeologist, for the first time, in Tószeg in 1948, where I excavated the Laposhalom site, which is the cornerstone of the chronology of the Bronze- Age in the Carpathian Basin. I also visited the newly founded Museum of Szolnok, whose director, Gyula Kaposvári, I had known from the university years. I met him again at the one-month professional training for archaeologists in Szentedre in 1950.1 visited Tiszafüred to update the inventory of the museum’s contents in 1953.

Being interested in the Copper Age and in the culture of Bodrogkeresztúr, in 1950, I went to Kunszentmárton to study the cemetery found by Kunszentmárton-Érpart and a specific grave of the Copper Age cemetery excavated in Pusztaistvánháza between 1925 and 1927. It turned out that the findings of the grave had been taken to the primary school and had been hidden in the ground in the school yard when the front-line had neared Kunszentmárton

during World War II. In 1957, there were made some unsuccessful attempts to find the hidden findings.

In 1950, it was reported that the river Tisza was washing away a cemetery by Nagykörü-Hidashát. József Korek then identified a cemetery from the culture of Bodrogkeresztúr but the archaeological excavation of the site became possible only in 1959. By that time, unfortunately, the whole cemetery had disappeared.

During the archaeological field survey of the Devil’s Dyke in the 1960s, I contributed to Hungarian archaeology with some significant results. As part of the preliminary works for damming the river Tisza, I made an archaeological field survey with my local acquaintances by Kisköre in 1964. Since the 1970s I have not participated in field work. However, I had visited Szolnok several times as the archaeological inspector until my retirement.

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