Horváth Attila – H. Tóth Elvira szerk.: Cumania 4. Archeologia (Bács-Kiskun Megyei Múzeumok Közleményei, Kecskemét, 1976)
H. Tóth E.: Az Izsák-balázspusztai honfoglaláskori lovassír
cal studies in the Soviet literature 32 , and Bálint' s references mention several analogous pieces to the Balázspuszta find. Although no close parallel can be drawn, especially not as far as precise size is concerned, the Borodajevka find 33 must be mentioned where the front pommel has similar decoration in the center. The Tuva find 34 holds another related saddle where the extraordinarily wide and curved rear pommel can also be found. These saddles, known only from reconstructions belonging to different dates bear great importance upon the reconstruction of the Izsák—Balázspuszta saddle, a one piece construction most likely. Csanád Bálint, with a well founded knowledge of the Nomad saddles inclines to list the Balázspuszta saddle to the „szart" type, and finds its reconstruction most successful as a combination with the,, szart" type. Since the distances between the sweat-flaps according to the pommel mountings, and base are about 4 — 5 cm on the Balázspuszta saddle, and a bridging seat-leather must be presumed we must emphasize the latter part of his opinion. It must also be noted, that the Balázspuszta saddle shows a close relationship with the saddle found on the bank of the Mongolian Hovd river, published by Katalin Kőhalmi. This saddle was almost complete and could be easily reconstructed with the help of contemporary representations. 35 According to the detailed description its seems that she rightly relates this to the Tuva saddles, but lists this type to the Kitay-Mongolian saddles of the 10—15th century, and dates it to the 12 —13th century. The decoration of the front and rear pommels are uniformly linear, just like in the case of Gádoros saddles, no background hollowing, or plastic protrusions are to be found. Nevertheless, the ornamentation of the front and rear pommels are different, just like on the finds of Soltszentimre. The motifs of the plates of the front pommel are a lined up, linked 32 А. К. АМБРОЗ:: Стремена и седла раннего средневековья как хронологический показатель (IV — VIII. вв.) Советская Археология 4. 1973. 81—98 33 И. В. СИНИЦЫН: Архелогические раскопки на территории нижего доволжъя. Саратов 1974. таъ. 9. 34 С. И. ВАЙНШТЕЙИ: Памятники второй половины и тысячелетия в западной туве. Труды тувинскох комплексной археолого — этнографической экспедиции ва — Ленинград 1966. 327. 40—41 Таъ. X—XI. 35 К. U. KŐHALMI: Two saddle finds from Western Mongolia. Acta. Arch. 1968. 346. up palmetted ornamentation with further complete or just starting palmettes twined on. The character, the design, and the application of the palmette decoration as far as one can tell from a find-report, are closest to the bone plates of the quiver of the no. 2 grave at Mindszent-Koszorús Balk. 36 The size of the palmettes are not identical with the Balázspuszta palmettes, they show an increasing and decreasing tendency filling up the widening and narrowing areas. The bone plate pairs of the right and left side of the front pommel do not represent mirror images. The right side plates have flatter, wider palmettes (Plate 29) whereas the left pommel plates show rounder, finer shapes (Plate 30). The different ornamentation of the different functional elements of the saddles is no new phenomenon. The local bone plated saddles are famous for their highly variegated palmetted and vined ornamentation. Notwithstanding, the linear vine motif with its stringed shoots of dot-circle lines of the narrowing plates of the rear pommel are unusual. The true characteristic of the dot-circle motif of the Gádoros bone plated saddle occur both on the sweatflaps and on the heart-shaped metal-resembling elements. The character of the patterns in our find is different, the opening leaf-bunches on the edge of the widening part of our plates are much closer to the monuments of the Avar bone carvings, mostly to the bone rimmings of the Csóka grave, whose half palmetted carvings were already pointed out by Gyula László 37 . This relationship is more distant with the vine intersecting leaf pairs ornamenting the outer edge of the rear pommel, which cannot be considered as one of the characteristics of the art of the Conquest Period either. The evaluation of the grave's finds The richly decorated bone plated saddle of the grave belonged to the trappings of an about seven year old horse, showing serious skull irregularities. According to János Matolcsi, the assymetry of the cheek part of the skull, with the tusk like premolar, even wearing 36 G. CS ALLAN Y : Újabb honfoglaláskori leletek Szentes környékéről. (New Conquest Period finds from the area of Szentes.) Folia Arch. III-IV. 189, 1-2. 37 Gy. LÁSZLÓ: im. 168
