Szabó Miklós, Petres F. Éva: Decorated weapons on the La Tene Iron Age in the Carpathian Basin. (Inventaria Praehistorica Hungariae 5; Budapest, 1992)

Epilogue

EPILOGUE The decorated weapons from the Carpathian Basin published and analysed here fall into the period between the second half of the 4th century and the very beginning of the 1st century B. C; their majority can, however, be assigned to between 300 and 150 B. C. This area was a peripheral one within the La Tène culture province in the period between the so-called historical migrations of the 4th century and the Balkanic invasions. The appearance of the Waldalgesheim Style gave rise to a flourishing eastern Celtic art, as shown also by the history of ornamented weapons. The periods immediately prior to and after the great Balkanic invasions were critical. The Hungarian Sword Style, an eastern dialect of La Tène art which surely equalled the artistic achievement of the west, was born in the tense atmosphere of the early 3rd century B.C. when Celts were preparing to overrun Macedonia and Greece, and various groups from the west mingled in the Carpathian Basin. The history of this style reflects the complexity ofthat age and, at the same time, also illustrates the artistic and cultural interaction of the eastern Celtic koine with the whole of the La Tène culture province. In this survey of decorated weapons the Late La Tène period has rarely been mentioned, only in cases if earlier phenomena could be shown to have survived into this period. We had to realize that a similar survey of the oppidum civilisation is impossible since in this respect the Carpathian Basin is — with some exaggeration to be sure — still a terra incognita. The presently accessible finds mostly come from old, unreliable excavations,

445 whilst more recent finds still await publication. The rarity of metal finds among these assemblages is nonetheless highly conspicuous.

446 We have therefore abandoned an aim of illusory completess and have regarded the close of the La Tène C period, i.e. the last decades of the 2nd century B. C. as the real boundary of our survey.