A Nyíregyházi Jósa András Múzeum évkönyve 36. - 1994 (Nyíregyháza, 1995)

Pál Raczky–Walter Meier-Arendt–Katalin Kurucz–Zsigmond Hajdú–Ágnes Szikora: A Late Neolithic settlement in the Upper Tisza region and its cultural connections (Prelminary report)

Polgár-Csőszhalom A Late Neolithic settlement in the Upper Tisza region and its cultural connections (Preliminary report) Pál RACZKY - Walter MEIER-ARENDT Katalin KURUCZ - Zsigmond HAJDÚ - Ágnes SZIKORA jLAjchaeological research has, until recently, considered the Late Neolithic of Eastern Hungary to be represented by the Tisza-Herpály-Csőszhalom cultural complex (BOGNÁR-KUTZIÁN 1966.265-269., KALICZ 1971.155-156., KALICZ-RACZKY 1987.a.). Its Transdanubian counterpart is the Lengyel culture, part of the painted pottery complex extending from Slavonia through Western Slovakia and Moravia to Little Poland (Fig. 1). The contacts between these two cultural complexes of the Tisza region and Transdanubia have been archaeologically documented at the Aszód settlement and cemetery where the Tisza, Herpály and Csőszhalom pottery types were found together with Lengyel pottery (KALICZ 1970., KALICZ 1983/1984., KALICZ-MAKKAY 1977.116-117. and map 8). A sharp variation can be noted between the settlement patterns of the Great Hungarian Plain and Transdanubia: the tell settlements of the Tisza culture extend as far north as the Körös rivers in the southern part of the Great Hungarian Plain in the final phase of the Neolithic, whilst the small conical tells of the Herpály culture represent the northern-most extension of this ultimately Balkanic settlement form. In contrast, the Lengyel settlements in Transdanubia, in the Danube Bend and in the Northern Mountain Range are without exception flat sites that did not accumulate into tells (MAKKAY 1982.a.l04-l64., KALICZ 1986., KALICZ-RACZKY 1987.a.l4-19). The presence of tells suggest local diffusion and later, the predominance of essentially sedentary lifestyles and an intensive agrarian economy in the Late Neolithic. The Vinca and Bucovat cultures of Serbia and the Banat probably played a mediatory role in this process (KALICZ 1989.104-105., KAISER-VOYTEK 1983., CHAPMAN 1981.25-27., CHAPMAN 1989. 14-19.). The marginal position of the Tisza culture is reflected by the fact that only the flat Tisza settlements have been identified north of the Körös rivers. A local process of integration, in the course of which the smaller settlements of the local Linear Pottery cultures were succeeded by the considerably larger and more extensive Tisza settlements, lying at a greater distance from each other, undoubtedly played a role in the emergence of this complex settlement system (MAKKAY 1982.b, RACZKY 1987. 69-70.). This would suggest a two-fold process at the beginning of the Late Neolithic of the Great Hungarian Plain: a local settlement concentration on the one hand and the spread of the southern tell settlements on the other (SHERRATT 1982.15-21., RACZKY 1987. 69-70.). János Makkay has argued for a parallel between this process of integration and the 'reconstructed settlement hierarchy' of the Tisza culture on the one hand, and the urban development in Mesopotamia on the other, and has claimed a meaningful link between the two (MAKKAY 1982.a. 111-163.). Recent excavations, however, would suggest that the settlement pattern of large Tisza tells and surrounding smaller settlements to the south of the Körös rivers should not be seen as the various phases of a single subsistence system, but rather as the coexistence of different populations of diverse mobility and economy. Far to the north of the Tisza and Herpály tell settlements in the southern part of the Great Hungarian Plain and the Berettyó region lies the site of Polgár-Csőszhalom. This settlement, with its 3-4 m thick cultural deposits and its conical form reminiscent of the Herpály tells, is unique in the Upper Tisza region (Fig. 2). The site itself has since long been known to archaeologists: Bognár-Kutzián's sondage excavation in 1957 brought to light a richly painted pottery assemblage and seven graves with a number of grave goods (BOGNÁR-KUTZIÁN 1958., BOGNÁR -KUTZIÁN 1963.382-386., BOGNÁR-KUTZIÁN 1966. 268-270, BOGNÁR-KUTZIÁN 1972.96). Only a single plate of the finds from this site was eventually published; Kutzián assigned the Csőszhalom group to the Late Neolithic of the northern part of the Great Hungarian Plain and noted its affinities with the Herpály group. Later investigations have shown that flat settlements of the early Tisza period also occur in the northern part of the Great Hungarian Plain, extending as far as Eastern Slovakia along the Bodrog river. Only after this early and overall expansion of