Bronze Age Treasures in Hungary

The legacy of the Late Bronze Age communities populating the Carpathian Basin between the 14th and 10th centuries BC represents the perhaps most colorful and numerous range of artifacts before the Roman conquest. These people transformed the landscape on a previously unprecedented scale with the erection of tumuli over their burials and the construction of monumental hillforts; they drew previously unbroken land into cultivation and founded many dozens of new settlements deep in the forest-covered hills and mountains. Their most spectacular relics are the hoards containing a dazzling array of bronze and gold articles, whose deposition and concealment has fueled incessant debates for over a century. We now know that the assemblages containing valuable weapons, jewelry and a variety of tools and implements were assembled according to specific cultural norms. Each of these hoards has a different story to tell: some preserve the memory of journeys to distant lands, spectacular rituals and sumptuous feasts, others evoke the toils of daily life and bloody wars. The widespread deposition and concealment of hoards is solely attested in Bronze Age Europe during the 2nd millennium BC – a similar practice is unknown during other periods in the history of Europe or on other continents. The research team headed by the author has systematically visited the known Bronze Age sites of Hungary and conducted metal detecting surveys in order to locate and salvage as many as possible of the Bronze Age treasures still hidden in the ground. This book offers a fascinating glimpse into this long bygone age through discovered hoards, bringing us closer to the peoples who buried them and the possible event behind their concealment.