Conservation around the Millennium (Hungarian National Museum, 2001)
Pages - 73
A DECORATIVE TECHNIQUE ON 7TH CENTURY AVAR FINDS "Spanish technique" in the Avar goldsmith's art Ilona Vámosi My study is destined to attract the attention to the fact that not all materials are the product of corrosion which look like that. Edith Bárdos, archeologist at the Directorate of Somogy County Museums has made excavations in the cemetery of the Avar age in Zamárdi since the autumn of 1980. (The graves no. 1-34 were opened up by dr. Kornél Bakay.) At present she is opening up the grave 2264 and approximately the same number of graves are still waiting for opening up based on the exploratory survey performed so far. It admits of an extraordinary and surprisingly great size of area, in itself, compared to the population of Avar cemeteries known so far. Consequently, this is the greatest Avar cemetery opened up in Hungary till now. The finds explored have numberless surprises in store. I do not want to detail in my study how colourful the finds of this enormous cemetery represent the history of culture and goldsmith's art of half Europe besides the Avar dominance. Thus I immediately come to the point of my unusual discovery made while cleaning the great strap end found in grave 1315 (picture 1, 2) to which I was actually led through a microscopic examination. The great strap end with a rope of strips originating from the 7. century together with other attachments was found in the course of excavation of 1993 as well as the finds of grave 2149, the small strap end, the detail of decoration of which shows identity with the decoration of the strap end mentioned before. These objects formed the starting-point of my tests. I have to note here how important role the proper setting up of colour and enlargement has at the preliminary microscopic test. The examination was carried out in a 2.5x0.63 enlargement in natural then filtered white colour. This is the grade of enlargement providing a properly seen evaluation. The work of goldsmith having good eyes can be well noticed thus the microscopic picture can be compared to 1. The front and reverse sides of the large strap end from Grave 1315 73
