Rural economy1

Abstract

Archaeologists have long been preoccupied with the basic economic relations in any given society. 2 More often than not, that was not a research goal in itself, but a way to understand complex social systems. 3 However, different theoretical assumptions may lead to very different interpretations of the nexus between economic relations and social structures. 4 This is particularly true for the research on the rural economy (or on economy in general) of the early medieval populations of Central and Eastern Europe. The area in question covers two-thirds of the continent, and one cannot simply assume that identical or even similar social and economic relations existed everywhere throughout the early Middle Ages. Moreover, Central and Eastern Europe, unlike the rest of the continent in the early Middle Ages, was home to populations with very different subsistence strategies at different stages of development in terms of social complexity. 5 Some are described in the literature as nomadic pastoralist societies (e.g., the Avars and the Magyars), others as settled societies subsisting on the long-term exploitation of local resources, the cultivation of crops (primarily cereals) and animal husbandry of domestic animals (e.g., Slavic-speaking peoples). Contacts are assumed, of course, between those populations, which are also regarded as coexisting over long periods of time. Their interactions are supposedly reflected in the development of subsistence strategies and in the rural economy. However, the transition between Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages in Central and Eastern Europe involved both continuity and rupture of economic systems. 6 Within East Central Europe, one particular area lends itself to a detailed study of this process of transformation—the Middle Danube region now shared by the (eastern part of the) Czech Republic, Slovakia and Hungary. The river Danube has been a major axis of communication and cultural contact between east and west since prehistoric times. This chapter will use this region to explore in detail some of the most significant aspects of the rural economy in the early Middle Ages. 7