CEU Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2011
| Author | Kodolányi, Judit |
|---|---|
| Title | The Medieval Cemetery on Sibrik Hill Visegrad |
| Summary | The topic of this thesis is the interpretation of the medieval cemetery of Sibrik Hill, Visegrád. The settlement of Visegrád situated above the Danube Bend in Northern Hungary played an important role in history during the centuries of the Middle Ages. In the Árpádian Period (1000-1301) an administrative center was located above the Danube, including a fortification, churches, a settlement and other institutions. During the twentieth century several archaeological investigations were conducted at this site, which revealed information about early Visegrád, and in the last decade several studies have analyzed and evaluated this material from different points of view, and have tired to create a complex image of the life in early Visegrád and its role in Hungarian history. In my study I would like to add a new section of this picture, an evaluation of the cemeteries belonging to the center. The subject required an archaeological study based on archaeological materials, but in order to evaluate and contextualize the results the application of historical methods was also needed. The cemetery reflects a transitional period from the row-cemeteries to the churchyards. It had two main parts; one of them laid around two churches built on top of each other. A tomb inside the second church and several transposed graves, and the abandonment of the church after a few decades made the picture more complex. In the churchyard particular grave goods, a chalice, a paten, and a penitential belt were found, indicating that higher-ranking ecclesiastics were buried in the cemetery. The thesis finds the parallels of these important grave goods in the European practice. This latter fact implies that the second church had a higher status in the ecclesiastic hierarchy, although its exact function has not been clarified yet. In the cemetery one can observe the main characteristics of contemporary cemeteries. In its character it manifests a period when earlier features were still active, while later features also appeared. The analytic chapter gives an overview of the results and patterns established by the evaluation of the cemetery from three main points of view: dating, function and topography. According to these, the life of this site took place in two major periods, from the beginning of the eleventh century to the first half of the twelfth century. The results support the theory of the development and decline of the early center of Visegrád, but do not provide answer to the question of the status of the center and the churches. At the same time, the research has shed light on interesting changes in burial customs, and led us closer to an understanding of living and dying in medieval Central Europe. |
| Supervisor | Jozsef Laszlovszky |
| Department | Medieval Studies MA |
| Full text | https://www.etd.ceu.edu/2011/kodolanyi_judit.pdf |
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