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This short survey intends to be a certain kind of introduction to the studies published in this issue of Acta Orientalia . It was the present author who, in the late 1990s, raised the idea to publish a book which would tackle the problems of Hungarian trade in the age of Ottoman conquest (16th–17th centuries) in a comprehensive way. He asked the most renowned Hungarian specialists of the field to dwell on various aspects of the topic. Unfortunately, the project could not be accomplished in its entirety for a variety of reasons. Some colleagues, owing to pressure of other engagements, could not complete their studies, while others, like Ferenc Szakály, suddenly passed away. Particularly his death proved to be fatal, because it was him who undertook to write the most comprehensive contribution to our would-be book on trade and traders in Ottoman and Habsburg Hungary (including to a certain extent Transylvania too). Finally, those who prepared their studies decided to publish the collected material, benefiting from the kind offer by the editor-in-chief of Acta Orientalia . The texts were edited by the present author who in this article tried to outline what should have been written by Szakály in greater detail. He focuses on the fate of the Hungarian traders and, in line with Szakály’s results, he concludes that, while the 16th century, owing to the rapidly expanding transit trade, saw the emergence of a peasant-burgher middle class, the worsening circumstances in the following century led to its eventual fall. The causes of this fall are highlighted in much greater detail in the studies by Zsigmond Pál Pach (who also died in the meantime) and Lajos Gecsényi. From their contributions it becomes evident that in the long run the Ottoman conquest dealt a tremendous blow not only to the political, but also to the economic life of Hungary, inasmuch as the shifting of the international trade routes, the rise of rival commercial groups and the disadvantageous imperial policies gradually crowded out the Hungarians from their previous positions. The thorough study by Antal Molnár, dedicated to the activities in Hungary of two of these rival groups, the Ragusans and the Bosnian Franciscans, emphasises the interdependence between commercial and religious life of the Christians living in Ottoman Hungary and the Northern Balkans as well as the vital role the merchants played in shaping their “national”-religious communities. János Buza explores an important but neglected aspect of monetary history: how the great powers’ struggle for supremacy in Central Europe reflected itself in monetary politics. He points out that the Habsburg, Ottoman and Venetian governments supported the primacy of their respective currencies by setting their rates of exchange higher than those of their rivals.The above-mentioned project has been implemented by the generous support of OTKA, the biggest scientific research foundation of Hungary (No. T. 018025).
There are above 1933 Megalithic Iron Age sites across south India; they include burial sites, habitation sites, habitation cum burial sites, Iron Age painting sites, isolated iron smelting localities near a habitation or burial. With the approach of economic archeology and sociotechnic perspective analyzing ceramics, metallurgy, burial monument (builder) and subsistent evidence (considering them as industries) that are found in the Megalithic burials as grave furnishers (The Material Archives Preserved in the Burial Monuments) from the background of Labour, Production and Industry that has economic imprints can be discussed on whether the Megalithic folks were nomadic, semi-settled or settled. This paper is an attempt to make a rough computation on the quantity of output that this culture might have in micro or in macro scale. This helps in understanding two aspects; one: whether they were nomadic, semisettled or settled at one location; two: diffusion versus indigenous development.
Abstract
Red deer canine ornaments have been known since the Upper Paleolithic as symbolic markers of the status of the possessor. A recent discovery made at the Iron Age cremation necropolis of Valea Stânii (Romania) probably provides the latest prehistoric occurence of this type of personal ornament. This find was part of the grave goods in the burial in barrow no. 4, a double grave (an adult woman and a subadult individual of unidentified sex). Among the cremated bones of the subadult individual were 16 personal adornments made of red deer antler, imitating red deer canines. Most likely, the ornaments were sewn on the funeral clothes. Such imitations of red deer canines indicate the transmission of certain cultural traditions, perhaps related to prestige and representation, over the millennia until the end of the Iron Age in Eastern Europe.
Abstract
The present article explores the way how medieval people thought about time and organized their lives in light of the constant passing of time. Whereas modern philosophers and historians have generally credited the Middle Ages with a radically different time concept in contrast to the modern world, here I will argue that occasionally the differences were considerably less stringent and perhaps not even existent. Often, quite naturally, the mental-historical framework was deeply influenced by the Catholic Church which perceived human life within the extremes of life and death, or of secular time and eternity. The analysis will take us from Old High German heroic epic poetry represented by the “Hildebrandslied” with its noteworthy emphasis on the many years in which the father did not see his son, to the late Middle Ages when Oswald von Wolkenstein, through his poetry, and Helene Kottannerin, through her unique diary, indicated their full awareness of the meaning of time in its measurable quality. Not every author reflected the same concept of time, and many of them simply took their readers to the timeless world of King Arthur. Other authors, however, such as the Stricker, expressed a clear idea of time almost in the modern sense of the word by way of positioning their protagonists in problematic situations when they are suddenly pressed for time and need to reach painful decisions. The article does not intend to blur the differences between the Middle Ages and our own cultural period, but it wants to deconstruct the romantic sentiment that the consciousness of time prevalent in the Middle Ages was completely different to the modern concept of time.
In the modern era the population of the Carpathian Basin, for political and environmental reasons, was bound to the fundamental alterations of the prevailing subsistence system. Over the course of the 16th and the 17th centuries the country became a borderland between the Habsburg and Ottoman Empires. The regional effects of the Little Ice Age were aggravated by the ravages of the warring armies. Moreover, the climate turned cooler and wetter, and in consequence marshlands and swamps grew significantly. The population of Hungary adapted to the nearly two centuries of warfare, the environmental effects, and the European economic environment by cultivating cattle breeding and exports. Cattle exports reached 250,000 at the end of the 16th century, and the country’s economic unity survived intact in spite of the fact that Hungary itself had disintegrated politically. Following the close of the Turkish wars, Hungary became a part of the Central European Habsburg Empire.
Although there is a wealth of studies on Romanesque metal bowls, no consensus has been reached regarding the craftsmanship, the depictions, the function, the distribution and the dating of these bowls. The assessment of the still unpublished finds from a smaller region can stimulate advances in this field. One case in point is the publication of the bowl fragments housed in various collections of County Békés.
The aim of the project entitled “Computerized Historical Linguistic Database of Latin Inscriptions of the Imperial Age” ( http://lldb.elte.hu/ ) is to develop and digitally publish a fundamental computerized historical linguistic database that incorporates and treats the Vulgar Latin material of the Latin inscriptions from a specific group of the European provinces of the Roman Empire in the first phase. This will, on the one hand, allow for a more thorough study of the regional changes and the diversity of the Latin language of the Imperial Age. On the other hand, it could also serve as a basis for subsequent international co-operation, in the course of which further work on the computerized historical linguistic database may be executed. This paper intends to present the past and the present, as well as the future possibilities of this Database.
The topic of the study is the description and complex analysis of the Ló-hegy site uncovered at Dunaföldvár in the spring of 2009. Features of the economic area of an Árpádian period village were uncovered during the excavation preceding the construction of highway M6. The metal and ceramic finds unearthed in the archaeological features date the settlement from the 12th–13th centuries. The observations made during the excavation suggest that the village perished in consequence of the Mongol Invasion.
The Copper Age cemetery of Budakalász
M. Bondár-P. Raczky (eds): Budapest: Pytheas 2009. ISBN 978-963-9746-72-5. 484 S., 88 Abb.
It has been suggested that literary history focused on reception can resolve the tension between aesthetic and historical criteria, especially if we concede that the concept of originality is deeply unstable and has both historical and aesthetic implications. The turn from impact to reception can be seen as a consequence of the fact that the ideal of the immanence of the self-contained work of art has fallen into disrepute. It is quite possible that a national literature does not lend itself as a subject to narrative history, just as the identity of an author's output or the continuity of the history of a genre can be questioned.
