A Nyíregyházi Jósa András Múzeum évkönyve 37-38. - 1995-1996 (Nyíregyháza, 1997)

Régészet - Ivan Popovich: Periodization and chronology of Kushtanovica type sites in the Transcarpathian region

Ivan Popovich possible to determine the shape. There were also four pits and a fireplace. The latter is situated in the centre of the house. It is oval and mesaures 2x0.7 m. The thickness of the ruins of the destroyed oven is 20 cm. Archaeological material collected inside the house consists of 140 ceramic fragments, 1 gray dipper, two miniature vessels, two spindle-whorls and a grinding stone (POPOVICH 1993.257.ris.128

.). House III R. VI 1986 is similar to this latter. Ceramic material was found within it including 159 fragments and one miniature vessel. There was a broken bowl with an inverted rim and fragments of pots with holes in the fireplace (POPOVICH 1993.257.ris.128.). The dating of the last two houses will be discussed later. Barrow 1 in Mukachevo/Munkdcs on Zhornina mountain belongs to the HC, period. The cemetery was investigated by the Slovakian scholar I.Pastor in 1945 (PASTOR 1946.). It consists a row of three barrows situated on the mountain Zhornina. The finds from the excavation are kept in the TransCarpathian Museum of Local History and have been only partly published (POPOVICH 1992/A.). Barrow 1 which interests us, is 8 m high, the diameter of its basis from north to south is 16 m while from west to east it is 18 m. The barrow consists of stones of medium size that were mixed with earth. Burial units were concentrated in the southeastern part of the space under the barrow, on a surface formed out of stones. A total of 13 urns and one burial consisting of calcinated bones in a small pile were found there. The absence of datable finds makes it difficult to determine the period when this cemetery functioned. The basic forms of the vessels that served as urns or accompanying vessels hardly differ in anyway from those known from Kushtanovica. These forms were used for rather long time, more concretely pots and bowls were used during the whole period of the existence of the Kushtanovica group of sites. However, I.Pastor placed barrow 1 to the early phase of Hallstatt period on the basis of the dating of urn 13 (PASTOR 1946.1-5.). Let us try to determine the date of this burial. LJrn 13 was 5 m south of the centre at a depth of 0.6 m. The urn was „sealed". The vessel has an everted rim with a high cylindrical neck and biconical body. The shoulders are separated from the body by a horizontal fluting from which incised triangles hang down (Pi. V.5). The ceramics are decorated by an incised geometric ornament characteristic of the Chiernyi Les culture (TERENOZHKIN 1961.59.), although this feature is typical for the Hallstatt finds for the whole of Central Europe. In the Transcarpathian region, black polished pottery decorated with a geometric ornament was first encountered on sites of the pre-Kushtanovica horizon, at the settlements of Horiany/Gerény and Uzhgorod/ Ungvár (OTCHET 1987.67.ris.l.,5.). At present, there are varying opinions on the genesis of this pottery. A.I.Terenozhkin thought it a product of the Chiernyi Les population (TERENOZHKIN 1961.215-216.). AI.Meliukova connected the origin of this pottery with the East Balkan circle of sites (MELIUKOVA 1979.28.). S.S.Berezanskaia, returning to the question of the origin of sites of Hallstatt times on the right bank of the Dnieper, followed A.Spicyn (SPICYN 1911.165.) and Artamonov (ARTAMONOV 1953.185-192.) in considering these decorative elements, as well as the whole of the Chiernyi Les culture, to be something that appeared in the forest-steppe belt of the Ukraine as a result of repeated waves of migration from the Carpathian-Danubian region (BEREZANSKAIA 1988.1216.). On the Kushtanovica sites, pottery with incised ornament, as we have shown above, appears in the earliest level of the settlement of Mali Heiivci, which in turn was synchronized with the Alsótelkes-Dalinka horizon dated to the end of 7th - beginning of the 6th centuries B.C. It is to this time that burial 13 in barrow 1 Zhornina should be dated. According to J.Chochorowski, as previously mentioned, the horizon of Alsótelekes-Dalinka sites appeared as a result of a chain reaction moved westward the forest-steppe population living on the right bank of the Dnieper, under the suppression of the Scythians. The Kushtanovica group of sites appeared as a result of these migration processes at the end of die 7th beginning of the 6th centuries B.C. (CHOCHOROWSKI 1987/A.178.). The same thought is present in the concept of G.I.Smirnova (SMIRNOVA 1989.19-32.). In light of the hypotheses of S.S.Berezanskaia, it is doubtful whether it is possible to consider the incised ornamented ceramics of the Transcarpathian region to be the result of the Chiernyi Les population taking part in the formation of the Kushtanovica group of sites. More than that, these ceramics also have prototypes in the post-Gáva assemblages in the Transcarpathian region as well as in the rest of territories of the LIpper Tisza region. We do not intend to deny the possibility that appropriate changes on the inner side of the Carpathians in the 7th-6th centuries B.C occured. However, these changes were not connected in anyway with the movement of the forest-steppe population into the Carpathian region under the suppression of the Scythians. Evolutionary processes in the milieu of Gáva assemblages are undoubted. However, we should connect cultural changes in the Carpathian Basin, coming together with the appearance of Scythians in the North Pontic region, not with direct buffer processes but with the move to the Great Hungarian Plain of Iranian language speaking Agathyrsos to Transylvania and Syginnae of Herodotus (CHOCHOROWSKI 1987/ A.161-218.). These people had definite influence" on the culture of the population living off the Transcarpathian region. It is difficult to imagine that the Chiernyi Les population, weakened by the constant attacks of nomads, could move to the neighbouring territories. Moreover, in the northeastern part of the Carpathian Basin fortified settlements appeared, most probably for defense from outside attack (SMIRNOVA 1966., BALAHURI 1972., POPOVICH 1991/B). Thus, materials from barrow 1 of the Zhornina cemetery together with certain assemblages from the settlement of Mali Heiivci make it possible to modify the beginnings of the Kushtanovica sites to the end of the 7th - beginning of the 6th centuries B.C. and with that support the suggestion that the change in GávaHolihrady assemblages was almost synchronous in both the East and West Carpathians (POPOVICH 1975.36.). 80 A Jósa András Múzeum Évkönyve 1997