New data to the research ont he 10th century textiles from the Hungarian Conquest period cemetery at Derecske-Nagymező-dűlő

Berta, Norbert and Harangi, Flórián and E. Nagy, Katalin and Türk, Attila (2019) New data to the research ont he 10th century textiles from the Hungarian Conquest period cemetery at Derecske-Nagymező-dűlő. Hungarian Archaeology. E-Journal, 2018 (autumn). pp. 27-35. ISSN 2416-0296

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Abstract

In researching the archaeology of the Hungarian Conquest period, the analysis of organic remains with modern scientific techniques has sparked increasing interest in the past decades.1 Despite being a rare find – and mostly only fragmentarily preserved – organic remains are an immensely rich source of data. Among them, textile fragments are to be mentioned in the first place. In regard to materials from the 10th century, two categories of textiles could be identified thus far. Linen, of which there was a more dense (better quality), and another, of inferior quality. On the other hand, there has been also a number of silk finds found (a textile often associated with the Hungarians in the written sources), moreover, their different knitting patterns could be also identified. Most of the silk finds recovered thus far were samite (samitum), almost without exception, demonstrating that this was a generally widespread type of fabric in this period. A different type of silk (taqueté) was documented first at Tarpa (in 2012),2 and then in 2016, at Derecske – both situated in Eastern Hungary. As will be discussed below, this latter find is particularly interesting as it demonstrates that the occurence of the taqueté fabric was not a unique phenomenon in the 10th century. However, there are no examples among the published textile materials from Northern and Western Europe, and it seems that they occur also quite rarely in Byzantium. Nonetheless, the find from Derecske suggests that the conquering Hungarians could have access to silk transports not only through Western Europe (as this could be attested both on the basis of historical and archaeological data), but also had other sources, perhaps through their eastern contacts.

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