DEPICTIONS OF THE HISTORY OF THE ANCIENT HUNGARIAN CEMETERY OF TISZACSOMA IN SCIENTIFIC AND JOURNALISTIC WORKS OF TRANSCARPATHIA

Abstract

For thousands of years, the territory of modern Transcarpathia was a highway and a place of settlement for nomads who sought their homeland. In this article, the strategic role, which the Upper Tysa region, the northeastern natural geographical gateway to the Carpathian Basin surrounded by mountain meadows, played in the resettlement of the equestrian nomadic people from the east, i.e. the Hungarians, is analyzed. It is well-known, that medieval written sources reporting on the Hungarian conquest, the «Gesta Hungarorum» (Hungarian deeds) in particular, are intertwined with legends and myths, and describe the events of their time (at the turn of the XII–XIII centuries) against the background events that occurred three centuries earlier. Due to some fictional elements and inaccuracies in the chronicles, researchers of the later era questioned the real, historical facts described in these sources as well. For example, Slavic and Hungarian historians have disputed the settlement of Hungarians, the relationship between Slavic natives and settled Hungarians, and the region's affiliation. The study aims to get one step closer to resolving this discussion based on the analysis of the sources, especially the Transcarpathian literature. The article summarizes the results of the archaeological excavations from the XIX century till now that prove that the Hungarians gained their homeland and settled in this area from the end of the IX century. Some of the Hungarian findings in Transcarpathia, mostly from burials, can be considered the oldest artifacts of Hungarian origin found in the Carpathian Basin. Today, not only unique burial sites have been excavated in this region, but also entire cemeteries (Berehove – Mala Hora, Tiszacsoma – Szipahát, from the name of the stream Szipa, near which burials were discovered), most of which can be dated to the end of IX – the first half of the X century. Ancient Hungarian archeological monuments of Transcarpathia form a single unit with a similar group of finds in the Upper Tysa region. Archaeologists have found several elite burials in the Upper Tysa region, including Transcarpathia, suggesting that the Hungarian political center was located in the eastern Carpathian Basin until the middle of the X century, rather than in the Transdanubia region. Ancient Hungarian archeological finds of Transcarpathia, in particular the necropolis of the village of Tiszacsoma, which is in the focus of this article, receive more and more attention in Hungarian and Ukrainian historiography. Archaeologists and historians representing different schools and areas have now come to a common denominator on several important issues, but there is no doubt that further local research is needed to answer the questions that arise.