EARLY ROMAN PERIOD BURIALS OF PÚCHOV CULTURE: BURIED NATIVES OR OFFERED FOREIGNERS?

• Authors: Pieta Karol
• Languages of publication: EN

Abstracts

EN

The study presents and analyses materials from two hillforts located in North-Western Slovakia, where the Early Roman Age skeletal graves were discovered. At that time, Púchov culture hillforts disappeared abruptly. Significant changes in ethnical composition as well as in power structure led to the modification of settlement structure in the Western Carpathians. Numerous pieces of weaponry, inventories and hoards show that both hillforts analysed in this paper were destroyed in the first decades of the Current Era. Inventories of graves containing Noric-Pannonian attire can be attributed to the same period. So far, we do not know any cemeteries or graves of members of the culture dated back to the younger La Tène and Early Roman Periods. There are only sacrificial sites with dominating cremation rituals. Female burials found on the slopes below the fortifications in Bytča-Hrabové and in Mikušovce belong – together with the older finds from Púchov – to unique finds attributed to the culture. Judging by the position of the deceased and detected fatal injuries, we can assume that these burials reflect some previously unknown ritual practices. The question of whether the deceased were members of the local culture or rather new colonisers – presumably coming from the Noricum milieu -  will be answered by prepared DNA and Isotope analyses.

Keywords

EN

WESTERN CARPATHIANS; NORTHERN SLOVAKIA; EARLY ROMAN PERIOD; PÚCHOV CULTURE; HILLFORTS; SKELETAL GRAVES

• Publisher: Slovak Academy of Sciences, Archaeological Institute
• Journal: Slovenská archeológia (Slovak Archaeology)
• Year: 2019
• Volume: 67
• Issue: 2
• Pages: 241 – 286

Contributors

author

Pieta Karol

• Archeologický ústav SAV, Akademická 2, 949 21 Nitra, Slovak Republic

Identifiers

DOI

https://doi.org/10.31577/slovarch.2019.67.8