Medieval Transylvania

Anonymus (the author of Gesta Hungarorum) was confirmed by archaeologists.

A Christian cemetery from 8th (also 9th and 10th) century was discovered at Jucu, near Cluj, the area were Anonymus describes the presence of the duke Gelou, ruling over Wallachians and Slavs.

The 80 graves have been dated by a type of ear-rings which were not used more after 8th century.



A team of movie producer is making a documentary material which, if would reach the necesary standards, will be casted by National Geographic.


The discovery ocured due to the plans of Nokia for building a factory in that land.









http://www.expres.ro/article.php?artid=323402#

Edited by Menumorut - 20-Sep-2007 at 07:09

He is refering to the Slavs in the areas close, the Slavs from Galitzia.

The article is writen bad, like usualy, the Romanian journalists are hearing bad and confusses the centuries.



I confess that I have read other articles (especialy from Cluj newspapers) and the data is varying from one newspaper to another, so, on average it seems is about



-a cemetery whose history begin in 7th century and which in 8 century was Christian (80 graves) and which continuates to be used until 10th century
-the village of the necropolis, with huts of local tradition
-the lack of Southern elements



Lets put together with what we know from elder data:

-Christian elements of 4-7th century have been discovered in Transylvania. In 4-5th century they are of a character showing the eclesiastic tradition, in 7th century there are rudimentar crosses on pottery of Dacian tradition

-the group of Bratei, the biggest and most longevive community of 1st millenium AD Transylvania (4-9th century) disscovered so far, has some Christian characteristics. And Bratei is not very far of Jucu.

-for the end of the 9th century, we have the mention of Gelou, ruler of the Wallachians and Slavs.






Edited by Menumorut - 20-Sep-2007 at 12:19

Originally posted by Menumorut The article is writen bad, like usualy, the Romanian journalists are hearing bad and confusses the centuries. I confess that I have read other articles (especialy from Cluj newspapers) and the data is varying from one newspaper to another, so, on average it seems is about -a cemetery whose history begin in 7th century and which in 8 century was Christian (80 graves) and which continuates to be used until 10th century -the village of the necropolis, with huts of local tradition -the lack of Southern elements Lets put together with what we know from elder data: -Christian elements of 4-7th century have been discovered in Transylvania. In 4-5th century they are of a character showing the eclesiastic tradition, in 7th century there are rudimentar crosses on pottery of Dacian tradition -the group of Bratei, the biggest and most longevive community of 1st millenium AD Transylvania (4-9th century) disscovered so far, has some Christian characteristics. And Bratei is not very far of Jucu. -for the end of the 9th century, we have the mention of Gelou, ruler of the Wallachians and Slavs.

Edited by Tar Szer�nd - 26-Sep-2007 at 09:20

1. Well this statements highly questionable. This dating was refuted in the 70's by Istv�n B�na and P�ter N�meth. (independently) B�na mentions that his reasoning was accepted by Pascu and his collaborators who worked on Dabaca/Doboka.

Such type of fortress (wich such plan) is characteristic for the earth fortresses. At the conquest of Transylvania, Hungarians didn't built castres but conquered the existing ones and used them.

Is a much to big coincidence that Anonymus speaks about the conquer of Dab�ca by Hungarians at the beginning of 10th century and a century later a fotress is the same area (Somes valley), with the same name and the same importance is found as a Hungarian castrum. Also, the similitudes with Biharia are almost perfect and at Biharia surely have been discovered important amenagements from the time of Menumorut.


I have copied the article on Dab�ca from The Encyclopedia of Ancient History and Archeology of Romania (1994-2000).

Look what is sayed:

Dab�ca, comune in Cluj county on whose territory there is a big fortification with earth waves, moats and traces of palisades (~15 ha) on the high terrace on the right of Lonea valley.

The ample researches initiated in 1964 are still in progress. The fortification, of a plan aproximatively triangular, consist of 4 concentric enceints. In its first period of existence, with two phases of construction dated from the end of 8th century until the beginning of 10th century, the waves and moats have delimitated on the top of the terrace four enceints: a) wide wave of ~5 meters preceded by berma (1,25 m) and moat 1,30 m deep, delimitating the enceinte I, of ~50 m lenght, replaced ulteriorly by a wave of double width than the first, preceded directly by a moat 3,25 m deep; b) 8 m wide wave with berma (2,50 m), preceded of 5 m wide and 1-1,5 m deep moat, delimitating the terrace III at ~230 m distance of the top of the terrace; c) 7 m wide and 2,54 m deep wave, delimitating the enceinte IV at ~600 m distance of the top of terrace... In the enceintes III and IV have been discovered semi-huts, surface dwellings from wood beams, provision pits, workshops (furnaces for the reduction of ores and smithies) which gives to the 9-10th century inhabitation the character of fortified locality. The oldest of the churches whose foundations have been discovered and studied at Dab�ca are not yet firmly dated; is possbile that they belong to 10th century. Most of the archaeological materials discovered at Dab�ca and dated from the end of 8th century to the beginning of the 10th century consist of pottery, at this being added metal pieces (spurs of Carolingian type gold plated) and jewel pieces (silver pandatives of Byzantine structure). It have been proposed the identification of the first etape of the fortification with the residence near Somes river of Gelou, the Romanian voivod of Transylvania in the first years of 10th century, atested in the chronicle of Anonymus (castrum suum iuxta fluvium Zomus positum). The ulterior development of the settlement from Dab�ca, in the time of the extension of the Hungarian domination over Transzlvania and when here have been installed the center of the comitate with the same name, is atested bz the writen sources (1068 - in urbem Dobuka).


I remember too to have seen reproduction of 8-9th century type of pottery from Dab�ca which surely are belonging to that period. It was of Dridu type.

2. Anonymus as a soure completely unreliable in the question of castles: The excavations in Alp�r (1977) show Anonymus' methods of work. There was an ancient fortress from the bronse age which was notoriously existed before the Hungarian conquest. Anonymus conneted this fact with a 12th century motte and appointed this place as a famous Bulgar castle home of duke Salan and write a great battle to his work in this place.

Is not a rule. At Biharia and Dab�ca, Anonymus was right, they were inhabited at the time of Hungarian arrival and they were the centers of two large voivodates.

3. Since written sources are not relible according to B�na we should concentrate of archeology in dating.

The chronicle of Anonymus is to specific to be entirely unrealist.

The Dabaca/Doboka castle was built in a casette/box structure. Its not a unique method. Zalaszentiv�n, �-Kolozsv�r/Cluj ??, Sopron, Moson, Aba�jv�r, Szabolcsv�r awere all built like this. It is clear that all this castles must be built in the same age by the same power.

I don't understand what means casette structure. And why do you believe that they have been founded by the Hungarian rulers? They could be built by the populations preceding the coming of Hungarians and the Hungarians only conquering them.

The fortresses built in that epoch by recently sedentarized peoples or by conquerors I think were made of wood, not of earth.

A rather great power not a local ruler a head of a clan were, since the building these fort was a large, expensive and long process need a lot of men. Naturally this building method appears outside the Carpathian Basin in Bohemia, Poland, Russia all in time of an emerging central power.

Correct. But in the case of Transylvania, the process was stopped by the Hungarian invasion. The fortresses at Dab�ca at Biharia could hve been under the Bulgar rule. And you should know that Menumorut answer "with a Bulgar heart" to the Hungarian leader. That doesn't mean indispensably he was Bulgar but that he was vasal of Bulgar empire. He too says is vasal of the Byzantine emperor and that his ancestors fighted against the invasion of Atilla. This proves that his ethnic self-conscience was actualy Romanian.

In the end B�na concluded that these castles (B�na includes Dabaca/Doboka ) are the creation of the centralisation of St. Stephen. They are the castles of the isp�ns, the centres of megyes/counties.

Dab�ca and Biharia doesn't start to exist in 10th century.

1. Gelou: There is an other possible origin of this name: As in many other cases Anonymus simply used a local toponym to create a local leader opposing the heroes of his gesta. 2. Rogerius mentions the abuses of canesii, the local collaborators appointed by the Mongols. He says no more.

1. Possible.

2. The canesii are not mentioned only in that context. There are several mentions of them:



contituerunt canesios id est balivios, qui justitiam facerent...et erant canesii fere centum... Conveniebant canesii pene qualibet septimana...Elegi igitur potius cum ipsis canesiis ad exercitum ire...Canesii vero ad recipienda munera acceserunt


These canesii surely are the Romanian knyases known from 14-15th century in other regions. Hungarians or Slavs were not organized in knyesates. So, the population of central Transylvania was in 13th century (because Rogerius doesn't describe an isolated case) entirely Romanian.



Edited by Menumorut - 29-Sep-2007 at 06:47

without mentioned in byzantian scripts of the that time (for ex. 600-900) in the territory. Actually the east romans could had been proud on the norther broders who fighted brave against the barbars, when the well informed scriptors (f.e. one of the imperors) would had ever heard about them (not even about one of the "3" knez terr.). Maybe at that time most of them were part of theinhabitants of the Imperium , and made transhumating wanderings in the Balkan, moving to the north.

The Daco-Romans were scattered population, peaceful (there are not weapons in their graves and villages).

Their material culture shows that they evolved separated from the South of Danube, they preserved forms of pottery from the "Classic" Roman period, while South of Danube the material culture and traditions was already Romano-Byzantine, signifiantly different to the Classic Roman period.

Look 5th century pottery from Soporu de C�mpie, near Cluj, a village were in 2-3rd centuries AD was the most important (discovered till now) Dacian community from the Roman province of Dacia.





And look 4-6th century pottery from Gropsani, in Oltenia:





Daco-Romans were mainly agricultors, this is what archeologists have found.

Konstantinos Porphyrogenetos: DAI (cc. 948-952) 40. About the tribes of the kabars and the turks "...There are on ththis place some antient relicts: the first, next to Turcia, the bridge of emperor Traianus, and after 3 days journey, Belgrad, opposit to the tower of Const. the Greath, and two days j. far away from Belgrad by the riverbend the so called Sirmium, and beyon that the unchristianized Greath Moravia, wich was destroyed by the turks, wich was ruled by Svatopluk before. In the near of the turks in there are the bulgars on the east, whit the river Istros between them as a border, wich is called Danube, too, there are the pechenegs in the north, in the west the franks, in the south the croats. ..."

There are described the rulers of these territories, not the inhabiting population. The territory ruled by Pechenegs was vaste, as Constantine too says in De Administratio Imperio:



This doesn't mean that in all this territory only Pechenegs were the inhabitants. Actualy, Pechenegs were an insignifiant minority in all the territory ruled by them, they were groups of warriors placed in the "capitals" of their khaganate but most population was not Pecheneg: Slavs in the area of today Ukraine, Romanians in Moldavia and Muntenia etc.

And no walachs, romanians, dacians, blachs (and cert. no state-like org-s of them) in the arabic (and horezmian etc) works about the territory.

So, you are not sure, one time you say no Romanians, then say certainly no state organization.





I think you should read again (or read for the first time) these points from Wikipedia:

In 545, Procopius mentions "the trick played by an Ant (a Slav or Alan from present-day Moldavia) who is supposed to have passed himself off as a Byzantine General by speaking a form of Latin which he had learned in these regions."

An ancient letter from one Emmerich of Elwangen to Grimaldus, abbot of St. Gall, written about 860 mention Vlachs, under the name of Dacians, living north of Danube together with Germans, Sarmatians, and Alans;

and "the World Chronicle of 1277, referring to the ninth century," possibly mistakens these Dacians for Wallachians.

The World Chronicle of Jansen Enikel, written in Vienna in 1277, mentions Charlemagne going on a campaign in the east (around 8th century) and met with Wallachians.


Nestor's Chronicle, (Kiev, 1097-1110), relating events from 862 to 1110, mentions Wallachians attacking and subduing the Slavs north of Danube and settling among them.

The Descriptio Europ� Orientalis, which was written by a French monk in 1308, discovered in the Paris Library in 1913, mention ten Vlach kings that were defeated by the Hungarians of Arpad.


and Weltchronik of Rudolph von Ems, written circa 1250, mention Vlachs living in Pannonia.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Origin_of_Romanians

No ment. in the work of Masudi (died in 956), just four turcic nations...and greeks in Belgrad -from the years 932-944. No infos in the works of Ibn Rusta, Gard�zi, Jayhani(the time about 870, he wrote about the pechenegs, the hungarians, chaucasian serirs and alans, about the burtas people, about the khazars, volga bulgars, slavs, russians, danube bulgars and moravians).

I'm wondering why you don't quote some Chinese chronicler.

Anyway, how do you explain the fact Balkanic Vlachs too are not mentioned in documents until 10th century?

About the Romanized population in Pannonia during the early midle age (late Roman and during the Avar occupation):



Keszthely culture


The Keszthely culture was created by the romanized pannonians in the VI, VII and VIII centuries around the fortified village of "Castellum" (now Keszthely), near the lake Balaton in now western Hungary.

This culture flourished under the Avars domination of Pannonia, as the artisan center of artifacts (mainly of gold) in the area.
.....
Only a few thousands romanized pannonians survived the onslaughts, mainly around the lake Pelso (now lake Balaton) in small fortified villages like Keszthely.

The Romanic population from Pannonia created the Keszthely culture that evolved mainly during the 6th-7th centuries. Its artefacts were made in the workshops of Roman origin located mainly in the fortified settlements of Keszthely-Fen�kpuszta and Sopianae (actual P�cs). The Romanic craftsmen worked for their masters (Gepidae and Avars).

Under the Avars the roman castle of Fen�kpuszta near Keszthely and the surroundings were not occupied so the original romanized inhabitants lived on undisturbed. They paid food and artisan goods for peace from the Avars. After 568 new Christian romanized pannonians arrived here, probably from the destroyed Aquincum (actual Budapest). The Keszthely-Fen�kpuszta fortress became the centre of a 30 km diameter area, where the people buried their dead adorned with jewellery and clothing of Byzantine origin. They rebuilt the fortress Basilica, where the principals of the community were buried, while their relatives found their final resting places next to the nearby "horreum" (granary).
Aerial photography: Gorsium - Herculia (T�c, Hungary), an urban center of the Keszthely culture




Aerial photography: Gorsium - Herculia (T�c, Hungary), an urban center of the Keszthely culture




In 626 the Avars were seriously defeated under Constantinople, which was followed by a civil war. The leaders of the Keszthely-Fen�kpuszta community had supported those who were later defeated. That was why the Avars besieged and then destroyed the fortress of Fen�kpuszta. They made the rest of the romanized population move into the territory of the town centre. The Christian romanized population got under military suppression. The cemeteries in the 7th and the 8th centuries entombed both Avars and Christians, but they were buried separately. The different religions did not allow them to mix even after death. The Christian romanized populations, who spoke their own romance pannonian language, cut from the outer world created a unique, characteristic material culture, which we know from the findings of the cemeteries near Keszthely. These findings got called the Keszthely culture. At that time, Keszthely was the center of the pannonian region because the Balaton's area was crossed by roads connecting the Danube and the Mediterranean.

At the end of the 8th century under the reign of Charlemagne, the Francs overthrew the Avar Empire and they invaded the pannonian plains. The Christian romanized populations living around Keszthely quickly took over the western Christian customs, which among others meant that they buried their dead without grove furniture so now it is impossible to identify them. The Fen�kpuszta fortress was repaired again in the 9th century. Its walls accommodated and gave shelter to the descendants of the Avars and the southern Slavic people who had migrated in at the beginning of the century. Their cemeteries kept quite a lot of the pagan customs. The 10th century was the darkest period of Keszthely's history. Neither traces of the survival of the earlier romanized pannonian population nor of the conquering Hungarians are known to us.


Handicrafts

By the end of the 6th century we find the romanized population mainly in the row cemeteries that were newly laid out in the area of the late-roman fortresses of Keszthely (Castellum) and of P�cs (Sopianae) (southwestern Hungary). During the Avars, there also will have been romanized and byzantine people arriving from the Balkans, and they helped develop a community of rich artisans. These probably Christian communities preserved or renewed their artistic relations with the romanised population of the Mediterranean.





Romance language groups in the Balkan peninsula. In blue the extinct Romance Pannonian language, centered around the "Keszthely culture"




The characteristic costume of their women includes earrings with basket-shaped pendants, disc brooches with early Christian motifs, and dress-pins. The early Christian symbols include crosses, bird-shaped brooches and pins decorated with bird figures (one bird-shaped brooch bears an incised cross). The romanized population of Pannonia in general became �Avarized�, and only in the close vicinity of Keszthely can their �island� of Late-Antique culture be traced, where their traditional costume was worn until the beginning of the 9th century.



Language

The name of the settlement Keszthely may mean a continuity, which can be traced back to the Latin "castellum" (castle).

The linguists Magdearu Alexandru (in Rom�nii �n opera Notarului Anonim) and Julius Pokornyin (in Indogermanisches Etymologisches Worterbuch) write that the word "kestei" (as is pronuncied in humgarian Keszthely) is similar to the venetian/istrian word "caestei", meaning castle, and it is one of the few surviving words from the extinct romance pannonian language.

This extinct language of the romanized pannonians has given many toponyms to the area around the lake Balaton.



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keszthely_culture


The data about Blachi in the Hungarian chronicles have a pair in the Russian Primary Chronicle, where the name Volohi is present in four passages. M. Gy�ni remarked that the data about the Volohi were borrowed from a Slavonic text written in Moravia in the 9th-10th century.

.............
The church organization was preserved until the 6th century, but the Christendom survived in popular forms. The Franks found in 796 a Christian population in Pannonia, which had clerici illiterati, i.e. without instruction. The Christians from Pannonia lost the church hierarchy during the Avar domination. In the 9th century began the christianization of the Slavs. This led to the final assimilation of the Romanic people, who were very few in comparison with the Slavs. The local Romanic population of Pannonia disappeared in the 9th-10th centuries. It was a different Romanic people than the Romanians.



Ch. 3. The Romanians in Pannonia

We saw that Pannonia was not part of the Romanian space. The possible presence of Romanians should be explained by migrations. N. Drăganu gathered many placenames of supposed Romanian origin from the Hungarian medieval documents. In some cases he was wrong, but there are enough place and person names attested in sources from 11th-14th centuries that could be considered of Romanian origin. Few examples: Bereve, de genere Negul (1247) in County Baranya, Chobanka (village near Buda, in 1267), villa Vlach (1275, County Valko).

The Romanians arrived in Hungary as shepherds from Transylvania but also from the region between the Timoc and the Morava. Serbia, Bosnia and Croatia had an important Romanian population in the Middle Ages, later Slavized. The Romanians spread from the South-Danubian part of the Romanian area. This explains the presence of Romanians in Hungary. A migration from the Timoc area into Pannonia is attested in 818. It could be supposed that also Romanians were involved. This could explain the presence of Romanians in Pannonia since the 9th century, as a different population than the remnants of the local Romanic people. Therefore, GH recorded a truthful information inserted into a legendary story about the Hungarian conquest. It should be observed that the tradition preserved by the Hungarian chronicles makes confusion between the local Romanic people of Pannonia and the Romanians.


http://www.geocities.com/amadgearu/notary.htm

And: sure they mentioned other inhabitants, not just the rulers.

Arguments? Do you believe that the pechenegs were the only inhabitants of Southern Romania?

Originally posted by Byzantine Emperor What was the Greek or Latin equivalent that Constantine VII used for the native designation vojevoda?  I am wondering if he was thinking of the designation in terms of what he thought was a comparable Byzantine institution or office, or if perhaps he understood it in the context of its native usage in Transylvania?   Chilbudios mentions that the author Brezeanu has Constantine referring to local warlords as duci, but that this term is not related to the vojevoda.

I think I was referring to Anonymous, the Hungarian notary, not Constantine. In De Administrando Imperio, 38 the Greek term is "voevodos".

What you want say with that F.e.?



About Constantine: I cann't discuss on your descriptions of the documents. Give me the text. For now, I can say that you speak about Bulgarians who exterminated Avars. Do Constantine mention Vlachs?



Is explainable that he was having more information about the territories of the empire or neighbour with the empire and for the far lands he was knowing only about the rulers. I repeat that the Daco-Roman and then proto-Romanian population was scarced, rudimentar, not like in Galia-France, Italy, Hispania etc.


You still assert that there was not a romanized population in Dacia but I gived you the explanations about the character of the Romanian language, which has such differences in the Latin origin fund from region to region that it couldn't be result of one migration or several migrations, because the linguistic groups from Romania are different from linguistic groups from Balkans: Aromanians and Romance Dalmats.


Also the archaeological discoveries shows a population preserving Dacian and Roman traditions not as a borrowing (as wee see, F.e., Goths borrowing Dacian and Roman form of pottery and Slavs borroing some Roman type of pottery).



I'm adding something more: how do you explain that the population from Dacia was Christianized, in the sense of a popular Christianism, not eclesiastic?



And another idea: if in Pannonia, which was such less naturaly defended, the romanized population survived until late, how do you explain that the descendants of the Dacians have vanished, when they were living in such a mountainous, valley fragmented and forsted territory?


Edited by Menumorut - 10-Oct-2007 at 14:45