Thinking in space! Why are funerary sites absent in eastern parts of Transylvania in the 7th-11th centuries?

Gáll, Erwin and Mărginean, Florin and Hőgyes, Huba Mihály and Horváth, Viktoria and Daczó, Levente (2024) Thinking in space! Why are funerary sites absent in eastern parts of Transylvania in the 7th-11th centuries? DACIA: REVUE D ARCHEOLOGIE ET D HISTOIRE ANCIENNE, 68. pp. 323-382. ISSN 0070-251X

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Abstract

Nationalist theories of the 18th‑20th centuries and the concepts of nation‑state characteristic to this period tried intensively to homogenise the notions of space, and in this case and in this regard, the territories like the geographically independent Transylvania are no exception. The homogenisation and generalisation, which sometimes occur in current archaeology as well – even, when not intended – go back to a much earlier period, already present at the ideological roots of the notions of space in archaeology and their visual, graphic representations: the maps. Based on this premise, after collecting 420 archaeological sites from the 7th‑10/11th centuries, the authors tried to analyse their geographical distribution, grouping them in two categories: 1. Settlements and cultural layers; 2. Burial/funerary sites. In order to avoid the above‑mentioned problem, the authors tried to analyse the finds from ca. 7th‑10/11th centuries through a regional approach, consequently, the finds from Transylvania are illustrated with four regional maps instead of one. As a result of the observations based on the divided representation of Transylvania on four maps, the authors can conclude the following: 1. The known archaeological sites are mainly distributed on an area stretching from the western, low floodplains to the somewhat higher, 500‑600 m hilly areas, although there are a few instances in areas with a much higher altitude as well; 2. However, the burial/funerary sites are documented primarily in the western parts of Transylvania (the valleys of the Someșul Mic, the middle course of the Mureș, and the lower course of the Târnava Mică and Târnava Mare Rivers), regardless whether we talk about the “Avar” (7th‑8/9th centuries), “Bulgarian” (9th‑10th centuries), or “Hungarian Conqueror” groups (10th century). Thus, we have to ask ourselves, to what do we attribute the apparent lack of burial sites in the eastern and central parts of Transylvania? A. The state of the research? B. If the territories in the western parts of Transylvania represented the peripheries of the “networks” of political‑military structures, perhaps the rest of the territories in eastern and central Transylvania have been veritable “no man’s lands”, not organized by the political power, with an uncertain situation or simply without status? C. May we – at least partially and supplementally– link this phenomenon to the usually smaller demographic background of the mountainous and hilly regions – as opposed to the lower areas –, observable on a regular basis to this day? These three points, seemingly independent of each other, but in fact, closely interlinked, represent merely a part of the range of possible and plausible explanations. The authors surmise that the lack of funerary sites in eastern and central Transylvania in the 7th‑11th centuries can be attributed primarily to the fact that these areas were a kind of “stateless”, unintegrated into the “network” of powers in the early medieval times. Without a doubt, the identification of the funerary behaviour of the populations from the 7th‑10th centuries in these regions remains one of main challenges of the future for the archaeologists of the early medieval period. Without any doubt, mountain archaeology, which will become a trend in Romania in the future, will offer a substantial impetus to debate with a modern, relaxed, much more complex and more sophisticated attitude, the thorny issues inherited from the age of nations (19th‑20th century). This database of 420 sites and the observations based on these were intended to serve this purpose.

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