Csilla Balogh

“THEY VANISHED AWAY LIKE THE AVARS…”

Avar period cemetery in Zamárdi-Rétiföldek
Openwork disc from Grave 2294
 Csilla Balogh
“THEY VANISHED AWAY
LIKE THE AVARS…”
Avar period cemetery in Zamárdi-Rétiföldek

Budapest–Zamárdi, 2018 (2019)

 Translated by
ZSÓFIA KONDÉ

Proofreading
BÉLA TORKOS

Technical editing by
KRISZTINA BERTÓK

Reconstructions and colour drawings of the burials by

FRUZSINA PÁPAI

Photos by
CSILLA BALOGH

Design
AURI GRAFIKA

On the cover
Strap ends from Graves 1354 and 1280

ISBN 978-963-9987-39-5

© Csilla Balogh
© Zamárdi City Council
© Rippl-Rónai Museum, Kaposvár
© Martin Opitz Publisher

The manuscript was funded from the generous grant

by the National Cultural Fund

RECOMMENDATION
Dear Reader,

The Avar period cemetery of Zamárdi is close to my heart: a dedicated teacher, Dezső Piller called the attention of professionals to the existence
of the graveyard by the report of my great grandfather, József Csákovics.
In 1972, Kornél Bakay unearthed 34 graves. Eight years later, archaeologist Edith Bárdos continued the rescue excavation. Under her lead-
ership, I had the opportunity to work on the excavation myself as a secondary school student for a few weeks. Spending time among students of
archaeology gave me lifelong experiences. By the end of the ‘90s, 2368 burials were excavated.
The Zamárdi City Council has always supported the exploration of the historical evidences of our land’s former inhabitants, since the treasures
hidden underground are the heritage of our ancestors. This, however, only becomes a real treasure if exposed to the general public.
In the past few years, the Institute of Archaeology at Pázmány Péter Catholic University continued the rescue of the well-known Avar period
cemetery under archaeologist Csilla Balogh’s direction. With the contribution of enthusiastic university students, approximately 60-70 new graves
were unearthed each year, even including intact ones that had not been looted by grave robbers.
“Archaeology is fossilized ethnography” – Gyula László believed, and this small volume reveals the past in this spirit. The rich finds yielded by
the cemetery located under and around the houses of present-day Rétföldi Street are the tangible evidences of the past; they allow us an insight
into the everyday life of our ancestors. The careful burial practices reflect their emotional attachment, and the cohesive force of the onetime com-
munity. By means of today’s technique, scientists can gain valuable information and draw exciting conclusions after examining the archaeological
findings.
This colourful volume is unique in its way: so far, those interested in history and the past have been able to learn about the most outstanding
artefacts of the Carpathian Basin’s largest Avar period cemetery mainly from exhibition catalogues. Now, however, by presenting some of the most
interesting find assemblages, burials and burial practices of the cemetery, the finds otherwise resting in storage boxes come to life. Among them,
besides the finds of earlier excavations, results of the latest investigations are also presented.
Many thanks for the dedicated work of rescue!

I warmly recommend it to everyone who loves Zamárdi or has an interest in researching the past.

Zamárdi, spring of 2018

Gyula Csákovics
Mayor
6
ON THE MARGIN OF THE RESEARCH PROGRAMME
Welcome, Readers!

General archaeological studies along with various research projects have been going on at Pázmány Péter Catholic University since 2012.
The Institute of Archaeology aims to train specialists capable of excavating, investigating, preserving and displaying the heritage of the times
until the early modern period. As our training is highly practice-centred, our prime goal is to introduce the students to national and international
research programmes that provide complex expertise and diverse field experiences. Our focus turned to the migration period in the course of
studying the historical antecedents of the Hungarian conquest in the Carpathian Basin, which has become a prominent research element of both
the Hungarian and English curriculum. Therefore, it has been a great honour that in 2015 Zamárdi City Council requested us to join the continuing
archaeological investigation of the Avar period cemetery of Zamárdi-Rétiföldek as professional coordinators. We accepted the opportunity gladly,
since it is one of the richest and most significant Avar period cemeteries of the Carpathian Basin, even on an international level. From a profes-
sional aspect, the new excavation results enable us a more precise and extensive analysis as well as interpretation of the cemetery as a whole.
Furthermore, it provides our students the possibility to acquire excellent practice in migration-period cemetery excavation; in field techniques and
documentation as well.
With the practical implementation and the conduction of the excavation programme, our institute entrusted Csilla Balogh, an archaeologist
specialized in Avar period studies. Thanks to her we established research cooperation first with the Research Institute of Turkology at Istanbul
University, and then with the Department of Art History at Istanbul Medeniyet University.
The research programme run by the Institute of Archaeology of Early Hungarian History and Archaeology of the Conquest Period for four years
has not only involved our own students but also Polish, Russian, Udmurt, Tartarian, Dutch and Turkish students.
Year by year the excavation offers notable results, as well as further academic successes: some excellent theses have been and are being
written, just like a research paper for the National Scientific Students’ Association, investigating the archaeological findings revealed here.
This publication gives an insight into the results of the past years, and presents some outstanding finds and rich grave assemblages unearthed
earlier. It serves as a clear evidence that it was worth continuing the cemetery’s excavation. Each year and each newly unearthed grave offers the
possibility of a new discovery and knowledge regarding the cemetery counting more than two and a half thousand graves by now.
We hope that our students can participate in the excavation and the processing of the “treasures” of the Zamárdi cemetery for many more years.

We wish the Readers an adventurous discovery through the pages of this book.

Piliscsaba, August 2018

Balázs Major PhD Attila Türk PhD

Head of the Institute of Head of the Department of Early Hungarian
Archaeology, and Migration Period Archaeology,
PPCU PPCU

7
INTRODUCTION
In 2015, the Institute of Archaeology of Pázmány Péter Catholic University asked me to join the archaeological investigation of the Avar period
cemetery of Zamárdi-Rétiföldek – restarting after a pause of more than 15 years – as conductor of the excavation. Hungarian and international
research had long known a number of prime finds of the Zamárdi cemetery from various exhibition catalogues, just like the material of the 2368
graves uncovered until 1998 and published by Edith Bárdos and Éva Garam in Volumes 9 and 10 of Monumenta Avarorum Archaeologica (2009,
2014). Unfortunately, the analysis of the finds had to be put on hold then. Even so, for those who studied this period, the ethnical and cultural
diversity of the community using the cemetery, as well as the outstanding significance of this site among the nearly three and a half thousand
Avar period burial places of the Carpathian Basin was obvious.
The opinion of Hungarian researchers varied on whether it was worth and necessary to continue the excavation of the cemetery, in which they
had already known more graves than in other large cemeteries. I, personally, had no doubt about the continuation of the cemetery excavation,
and the inherent opportunities and professional outcomes. We knew by the evidence of the narrow research trench opened north and south of
the cemetery section uncovered by Edith Bárdos, aiming to detect its extension, that besides the 2368 burials excavated until 1998 the cemetery
probably contained nearly the same amount of graves yet. Moreover, the discovery of every new grave is a step further towards a more detailed
and precise knowledge on the graveyard as a whole.
In addition to professional aspects and interests in a narrow sense, another apropos of this research excavation was to provide practice field
for students of archaeology for acquiring methods of Migration period cemetery excavations. I believe the past four seasons of excavation were
successful in several respects. Dozens of students have participated, acquired skills in excavating graves, and learned the various phases of
recording. Furthermore, the interest of some students who became acquainted with the Migration period in Zamárdi turned towards the research
of the Avar period, resulting in university theses and a research paper for the National Scientific Students’ Association.
Year by year, the interest of people from the neighbourhood is growing towards the results of the excavation, and a number of new phenomena
have come to light that might even be a novelty for professionals. Therefore, we decided to publish the first results by presenting the most inter-
esting observations, details, and new phenomena, even though the restoration and scientific processing of the material of the 332 features having
been revealed on a nearly 3000 m2 area from 2008 are still in progress. In most cases, these results supplement Éva Garam’s analyses written
on the material of former excavations, and published meanwhile in Volume 12 of Monumenta Avarorum Archaeologica (2018).
Our goal is therefore a preliminary report; however, as our research is an organic continuation of the earlier, nearly two decades of excava-
tions, and our results complete the results of those, we thought that our publication would be kind of a torso without presenting the earlier finds.

8
This is the reason why we decided to create a small volume that aims to provide an insight into the cemetery as a whole, by presenting some
exciting burial practices, special finds and find assemblages, while touching upon both previously and newly unearthed materials. Obviously, it is
not possible to provide an overall, comprehensive view of the cemetery within the framework of this booklet. We have thus sought an approach
that reveals the few artefacts and phenomena selected from the culturally complex, abundant material of the cemetery in a way that brings people
once living here to life. Beside the field photographs and pictures of the finds, we present reconstructions of the original artefacts and costumes
that “narrate” the onetime way of use of the archaeological finds and clothing elements in pictures. Fruzsina Pápai, former student of the Institute
of Archaeology at Pázmány Péter Catholic University shaped the reconstructions striving for professional authenticity into artistic illustrations; she
formed the information revealed by scientific methods into scenes, movements, and feelings between the characters.
I hope that if citizens of Zamárdi leaf through the pages of this book, they will be even prouder of their city, and that nearby residents and
“wanderers” arriving from afar will be even more interested in this little town on the shore of Lake Balaton. I also hope that it will convince sceptical
archaeologists that it is indeed worth continuing to research the cemetery, as each and every grave includes the possibility of a new discovery.
Special thanks go to mayor Gyula Csákovics who helped turning our friendly conversation into a decision, and created the necessary financial
conditions. We also owe thanks to the City Council of Zamárdi for funding the excavation year after year. In the last years, many of our colleagues
participated in the project for a longer or shorter period: archaeologists Tamás Czuppon, Bence Gulyás and Géza Szabó, anthropologists Antónia
Marcsik, Erika Molnár and Olga Spekker, and archaeozoologist Éva Ágnes Nyerges. I am indebted to them for their selfless assistance. From 2015,
the archaeological objects – often in very poor condition – have been in great care in the hands of Bernadett Dobó, Márta Borbíró and Teréz
Vidovics, who reveal their beauty from under the thick corrosion or dried layer of dirt, and restore their original glow. Here, again, I would like to
express my gratitude for their careful work. Our research is not a one-person success but the hard and persistent work of many students. I hope
that they will take part in this “adventure” for many more years.
9
Zamárdi, August 2018
Csilla Balogh PhD
archaeologist

9
The nice and colourful clothing of the commu-
nity’s female members is striking in the earlier
part of the Zamárdi cemetery, even though, due
to the large proportion of looting, the complete
reconstruction of the clothing and the accesso-
ries is only possible in some exceptional cases.
The male-female double burial of Grave 517-518
originates from the earlier phase of the cemetery.
Since contemporaneous disturbance only affect-
ed the man’s side, Grave 517 – one of the richest
female burials of the cemetery – was found in-
tact, allowing us to imagine the “fashion” among
the Eastern Pannonian communities with Ger-
manic culture in the first half of the 7th century.
The woman wore gold earrings with a spher-
ical pendant adorned with beaded filigree wire in
her ears. A multi-line necklace strung of colourful
beads hung on her neck. Her band finger-ring with
rhomboid flaring head and silver bracelets worn on
her wrists were decorated with chip-carved ribbon
interlace. A belt fastened by a cast shield-shaped
silver buckle tied her clothing. A  cast openwork
disc hung from a leather or textile ribbon on the
left side of the waist, which held two hair or veil
pins inserted into a leather case, a knife with silver
sheath, and an iron key by bronze chains.
The iron keys with a forked tip occurred in the
female graves of Allemandes, Longboards, Ba-
juvars, Thuringians, and Anglo-Saxons with Late
Antique, Mediterranean roots, as well as in some
cemeteries in Eastern Transdanubia. It cannot be
decided whether the woman interred in Grave 517
of Zamárdi wore the key as an accessory belong-
ing to the Germanic-type belt with long hanging
strap, or it had a peculiar meaning such as “loos-
ening and binding” in Antiquity, or anything else.
In Zamárdi, some of the female graves with keys
– just like the female burial of Grave 517 – also
yielded coffins adorned with sheet crosses. This 47
might indicate that there was some kind of ideo-

36
 logical content behind the habit of wearing keys,
possibly Christian faith. A large chalcedony bead,
a blue glass bead in silver sheet framework, and a
chain armour fragment set in a conoid iron frame-
work was also fastened to the disc by chains.
Their wearer could attribute magical, protective
power to them. The needle case made of bronze
sheet was installed to the belt by a separate strap,
and a Roman, omega-shaped fibula was proba-
bly dangling next to it. Besides the small buckles,
48 49
straps terminated by strap ends with chip-carved
ribbon interlace fastened the woman’s footwear
and tights below the knees.
The belt with a long hanging strap is one
of the most special clothing elements from the
female burials of the Zamárdi cemetery. The
female belt with strap-ends and mounts, or the
cingulum folded to the belt and usually adorned
with mounts, is a characteristic group among
the Avar period female belts. Primarily, it became
known among the find material of the population
with various cultural roots living in Eastern Trans-
danubia, especially in the northern and southern
region of Lake Balaton in the Avar period. Avar
period male belt mounts were on the waist belt
and the fittings hanging from it, and its ends –
one hanging freely and the other terminated by
a large strap end – were undecorated. By con-
trast, the mounts of the above mentioned female
belts were arranged before the large strap end,
thus lengthwise on the section of the strap that
hung down long, sometimes until the ankle, or
on the leather or textile ribbon folded separate-
ly onto the belt. The majority of the belt mounts
was square or rectangular, and no further mount
types occurred beside the mounts and the large
strap ends. Dominantly, various types of ribbon
interlace adorned the pressed mounts of female
graves, while by the end of the 7th century, un-
decorated, double-plated pieces held together
by a sideband outnumbered strap ends deco-
rated with punched plaits. At the beginning of
the 8th century, cast mounts also appeared on
female belts with a long hanging strap, primarily
on the straps holding the decorative discs.
The custom of Merovingian origin of women
wearing belts with a long hanging strap became
common in Zamárdi from the middle quarter of
the 7th century, and this special clothing element
can be tracked until the middle of the 8th century.
37
In contrast with the variously adorned bronze
openwork discs of female graves, the discs and
rings with suspension loops revealed in male
graves are not only rarer (occurred in 14 graves
in Zamárdi), but simpler, undecorated, and usu-
ally smaller (with 4-6 cm diameter) too. Discs
with concentric openwork or spokes are the
most frequent types among them. While some-
times 2-4 discs hung from women’s belts, male
graves always yielded only one of them.
They were worn on the right side of the waist;
usually, they can be found beside the thighbones,
together with knives, awls, and fire-lighting im-
plements. Their function could be the same as
that of the discs from female graves: distributing
straps or suspending useful items. However, they
also occurred as simple pendants.
Rings with loops and discs were found with
plain sheet or punched ribbon interlace belt sets
and as pendants of sets decorated with griffin
72
and tendril ornaments, which implies that the
majority of them originates from 8th-century
male graves.

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