Mursella

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Mursella (Hungary)
Mursella
Mursella
Location of Mursellas in Hungary

Mursella refers to a municipality in the former Roman province of Pannonia Superior in today's Hungary . The vicus was on the long-distance route Savaria - Arrabona - Brigetio , which served as an important trade and supply route in the province at that time. The Municipium has been scientifically investigated since the beginning of the 20th century and has been further explored in several excavation campaigns using interdisciplinary methods. The history of the settlement extends from the first half of the 1st century to the 3rd century AD and can be divided into four main construction phases.

Location Mursellas in the province of Pannonia

Geographical location

The Roman Mursella lies between the rivers Raab and Marcal on the Dombiföld in the municipalities of Árpás and Mórichida , about 32 kilometers southwest of Győr , in the Győr-Moson-Sopron county in Hungary. The favorable location on Marcal and Raab played an important role in ancient times. The Marcal culminated earlier further south than today in the Raab, probably just north of Mursella and formed there probably a ford , which the traffic routes between Danube limes and Amber Road to cross the river system allowed. The location was therefore a suitable place and ascribed to Mursella an important traffic-related role, which was reinforced by the construction of a military camp in the 1st half of the 1st century.

The Savaria-Arrabona-Brigetio long-distance road: cities (triangle) border fortifications (squares) mining houses (circles)

Research history

At the end of the 19th century, repeated references to robbery excavations gave the local population the opportunity to carry out a first excavation , which in 1927 led to the first systematic investigation of the area. Archaeologists from the Hungarian National Museum located a late Roman burial ground in the course of this excavation , which is referred to as an eastern necropolis in later research.

Between 1956 and 1958, 150 more graves of late antiquity were necropolis by Endre Bíró exposed.

Two years later, the so-called Südfriedhofs was discovered, a necropolis that, in addition to body burials, also included cremation graves from the Middle Imperial period . Due to the numerous late antique burials and the high proportion of late Roman coin finds, Mursella was interpreted as a fortified settlement of Inner Panonia from late antiquity, for which, however, no field archeological evidence has been found.

In the years 1975 to 1989, under the direction of Eszter Szőnyi, further excavations were carried out in the western part of the ruins on an area of ​​3000 m² near the ancient city center. Contrary to previous assumptions, the investigations led to the discovery of an open settlement from the Roman Empire and the discovery of the Savaria-Arrabona-Brigetio highway. Based on the findings available to her, Szőnyi divided the development of the settlement into four main construction phases.

In Carnuntum , the provincial capital, a stone monument of the scribe Claudius Galonius, which dates between AD 200 and 300, and another of the councilor Caius Iulius Proculus in Lovászpatona , dates between AD 150 and 250. The grave inscriptions provide information on the legal status of the city of Mursella and were discovered outside the city.

Between 2005 and 2015, in cooperation with the Xantus János Museum, scientific and archaeological staff at the Philipps University of Marburg , the Ruprecht-Karls-University of Heidelberg , the Johann Wolfgang Goethe University of Frankfurt am Main and the Friedrich Schiller University of Jena established a number of scientific disciplines inclusive research project carried out. From 2010 to 2015 the project was financially supported by the DFG . With the help of geomorphological , pedological and palynological research, attempts were made to reconstruct the natural geographic features of the environment of the Roman settlement. As part of this project, several test drillings were carried out in the vicinity of Mursella to obtain a pollen profile. With the help of a terrestrial laser scan , it was possible to create a microtopography of the site in which the course of the silted-up oxbow lake of the Raab River was precisely documented.

Settlement history

Aerial view of the Savaria-Arrabona-Brigetio road connection with floor plans for civil housing in the Mursella settlement area

The history of the Roman settlement begins with the establishment of a military garrison in the first half of the 1st century AD. With the securing of the Savaria-Arrabona-Brigetio when crossing the rivers Marcal and Raab, the Roman occupation and later the establishment of the city of Mursella began to a municipality. Little is known about the pre-Roman population in the deserta Boiorum , an area that roughly corresponds to today's Vienna Basin and Burgenland .

In the middle of the 1st century, an increasing growth of the settlement can be seen, which is evident in the increasing findings of ceramic kilns, wells, clay extraction pits and post structures . The ceramic finds show an occurrence of types from Celtic tradition as well as provincial Roman ceramics. During this time the Roman influence grew and an auxiliary fort was built on the main road.

At the beginning of the 2nd century, in Hadrianic times, Mursella was granted city rights, but this did not result in an increasing population and construction activity, as in other cities in the surrounding area. Rather, what can be seen is a decrease in the number of coins and pottery finds and thus the associated delay in settlement development.

In the 3rd century, the first stone buildings were built, where the Mediterranean influence can be recognized. Elsewhere, in border cities, this development began as early as the 2nd century and thus much earlier.

Despite the important function of the city as a municipality, it has only a small structure in terms of area and does not extend more than 18-20 hectares. Socially important buildings, most of which were built during Romanization, cannot be seen in Mursella. There is no evidence of a forum either, and only slight Roman influence can be seen in the residential structures. Until the 3rd century there was only a small amount of Mediterranean influence and the city seems to be more indigenous. This overlaps with sites from the immediate vicinity of Mursella. The settlements there show no change in the intensity of settlement or land use during the Roman occupation.

Geoarchaeological research

Surface investigations

Archaeological survey near Dombiföld

Archaeological surveys show a concentration of Roman and Imperial finds in the western settlement area, which is characterized by stone buildings. Pottery from the early Middle Ages and the pre-Roman metal ages, on the other hand, is more likely to be found in the east and south. This shows that the settlement core during the Roman occupation differs from the indigenous, more extensive settlement area. Inspections with a metal detector as an aid have uncovered a large number of coins, metal brooches , militaria and other small finds. The onion head fibula from late antiquity shown was found in the necropolis and is now in the Xántus János Museum in Győr. The large number of fibulae of the Noric-Pannonian type emphasizes once again the thesis of a particularly intensive early imperial settlement.

Onion head fibula from the 3rd / 4th centuries Century AD

Site inspections were also carried out in the surrounding area in order to get to the bottom of the question of whether the Roman occupation resulted in a change in the landscape in the deserta boiorum . The reading finds of the sites Megág-Dűlő (Árpas), Bodonhely and Dombiföld 2 show a settlement of the area since the younger Stone Age, which increased strongly in the Bronze and Iron Ages . Also spätlatène- and Roman Iron Age finds were picked up and show that settlement continuity prevails in the area, which can be explained by the favorable geographic location and the soil conditions. The sites are above the floodplain on sandy low terraces and thus outside the floodplain of the Raab, which can lead to significantly more water when there is heavy rainfall.

Geophysical investigations

16 geomagnetic probes

In order to identify the ancient structures more precisely, geophysical surveys have been carried out in the area since 2005 . So began a geomagnetic investigation of an area of ​​17.4 hectares, which was supplemented by investigations with georadar and geoelectrics . The results confirmed the course of the main road on which the city was located and provided clear knowledge of the structural structures of the stone buildings. They also confirmed the existence of the presumed military camp east of the settlement core. The size could be measured at a length of 180 m and a width of 150 m and shows that the building allowed enough space for Roman cohorts . The structure previously known as the forum was also examined in more detail. The building with a central courtyard area and several storage and storage rooms could be associated with the Raab paleo channel, which could have served as an anchorage at the point. It is therefore plausible to view the structure more as a storage facility or port. Overall, Mursella's settlement area was probably no larger than 18–20 ha during the half-timbered and stone construction period. Aerial photos and geophysical prospecting images show that the area of ​​the pit houses, on the other hand, extended further south and east of the settlement core.

Magnetic prospecting, which was carried out in the surrounding area at the Megág-Dűlő and Bodonhely sites, ensured that traditional excavations were started there due to the density of archaeological findings. On the lower terraces at Árpás (Megág-Dűlő) there were pit houses, which are divided by a ditch system, as well as several burial mounds in the same area in which Roman ceramics also appear. Similar structures with pit houses, ditch systems and storage pits were also apparent in Bodonhely. The course of the road of the Savaria-Arrabona-Brigetio, which comes from the south and at the Bodonhely site, makes a curve to the east in the direction of Mursella to avoid areas threatened by flooding, could also be made clearer by the prospecting. These investigations in the area of ​​Mursella confirm a settlement continuity in the Little Hungarian Plain .

Geomorphological and palynological studies

On the basis of the geophysical and archaeological preparatory work, the ancient river banks of Marcal and Raab could be systematically developed through geoscientific and palynological investigations. In the floodplains in order Árpás and Mórichida, along the common Paläorinne Raab and Marcal, lying wetlands provide ideal conditions for the preservation of palynolgischen archives. A total of 23 boreholes were drilled in oxbow lakes and wetlands, which, due to their position and geomorphology, indicated favorable profiles and good pollen conservation . 16 of them in the area around Mursella, 7 more in Bodonhely, 5 km to the north. The tried and tested paleoresses around Mursella always showed similar stratigraphic sequences with a maximum depth of 2 m.

The aim of these investigations was the reconstruction of the vegetation development by comparing the palynological indicators with the archaeologically obtained results for the period 2800 to 1500 BP and the question of the continuity of land use in the late Holocene and the cultural change at the beginning of the 1st century AD ., the transition from the pre-Roman Iron Age to the Roman Empire.

Compared to Central European studies, where the pre-Roman Iron Age was a period of cultural boom, palynological studies in the region of Lake Balaton and in the catchment area of ​​the southwest Hungarian Zala show a clear interruption in agriculture during this time. This indicates that the Roman conquerors did not find a fully developed agricultural landscape , such as in the Upper Germanic Dekumatsland or in the Lower Germanic Vulkaneifel .

literature

  • Eszter T. Szőnyi: Houses in Mursella Municipality, In: P. Scherrer (Ed.), Domus. The house in the cities of the Roman Danube provinces. Files of the 3rd International Symposium on Roman Cities in Noricum and Pannonia. Vienna 2008, pp. 235–249.
  • Szilvia Bíró, Attila Molnár, Christina Salat, Heike Schneider, Felix Teichner : On the trail of the Romans. Sopron Múzeum, Győr 2006. pp. 42–48. ( online )
  • Szilvia Biró, Attila Molnár, Christina Salat, Felix Teichner: Geophysical investigations on the territory of Mursella. In: Archaeological investigations in hungary 2006 , Budapest 2007, ISSN  1587-978X . Pp. 67-78. ( online )
  • Felix Teichner: On the sustainability of Roman spatial planning in Pannonia using the example of a settlement chamber at Marcal and Raab. With a contribution by Heike Schneider In: Ute Lohner-Urban, Peter Scherrer (eds.), The upper Danube region 50 v. until 50 AD , Berlin 2015. pp. 313–335. ISSN  1868-1875 . ( online )

Web links

Commons : Mursella  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Felix Teichner, On the sustainability of Roman spatial planning in Pannonia using the example of a settlement chamber at Marcal and Raab. With a contribution by Heike Schneider In: Ute Lohner-Urban, Peter Scherrer (eds.), The upper Danube region 50 v. until 50 AD , Berlin 2015. p. 319.
  2. ↑ Szilvia Bíró, Attila Molnár, Christina Salat, Heike Schneider, Felix Teichner: On the trail of the Romans. Sopron Múzeum, Győr 2006. p. 43.
  3. ↑ Felix Teichner, On the sustainability of Roman spatial planning in Pannonia using the example of a settlement chamber at Marcal and Raab. With a contribution by Heike Schneider In: Ute Lohner-Urban, Peter Scherrer (eds.), The upper Danube region 50 v. until 50 AD , Berlin 2015. p. 319.
  4. ↑ Felix Teichner, On the sustainability of Roman spatial planning in Pannonia using the example of a settlement chamber at Marcal and Raab. With a contribution by Heike Schneider In: Ute Lohner-Urban, Peter Scherrer (eds.), The upper Danube region 50 v. until 50 AD , Berlin 2015. p. 316.
  5. ↑ Szilvia Bíró, Attila Molnár, Christina Salat, Heike Schneider, Felix Teichner: On the trail of the Romans. Sopron Múzeum, Győr 2006. p. 45.
  6. ↑ Felix Teichner, On the sustainability of Roman spatial planning in Pannonia using the example of a settlement chamber at Marcal and Raab. With a contribution by Heike Schneider In: Ute Lohner-Urban, Peter Scherrer (eds.), The upper Danube region 50 v. until 50 AD , Berlin 2015. p. 316.
  7. ↑ Felix Teichner, On the sustainability of Roman spatial planning in Pannonia using the example of a settlement chamber at Marcal and Raab. With a contribution by Heike Schneider In: Ute Lohner-Urban, Peter Scherrer (eds.), The upper Danube region 50 v. until 50 AD , Berlin 2015. p. 321.
  8. ↑ Felix Teichner, On the sustainability of Roman spatial planning in Pannonia using the example of a settlement chamber at Marcal and Raab. With a contribution by Heike Schneider In: Ute Lohner-Urban, Peter Scherrer (eds.), The upper Danube region 50 v. until 50 AD , Berlin 2015. p. 316.
  9. ↑ Eszter Szőnyi, Houses in the Mursella Municipality , In: P. Scherrer (Ed.), Domus. The house in the cities of the Roman Danube provinces. Files of the 3rd International Symposium on Roman Cities in Noricum and Pannonia. Vienna 2008, pp. 235–249.
  10. ↑ Eszter Szőnyi, Houses in the Mursella Municipality , In: P. Scherrer (Ed.), Domus. The house in the cities of the Roman Danube provinces. Files of the 3rd International Symposium on Roman Cities in Noricum and Pannonia. Vienna 2008, pp. 235–249.
  11. ↑ Felix Teichner, On the sustainability of Roman spatial planning in Pannonia using the example of a settlement chamber at Marcal and Raab. With a contribution by Heike Schneider In: Ute Lohner-Urban, Peter Scherrer (eds.), The upper Danube region 50 v. until 50 AD , Berlin 2015. p. 328.
  12. ↑ Felix Teichner, On the sustainability of Roman spatial planning in Pannonia using the example of a settlement chamber at Marcal and Raab. With a contribution by Heike Schneider In: Ute Lohner-Urban, Peter Scherrer (eds.), The upper Danube region 50 v. until 50 AD , Berlin 2015. p. 323.
  13. ↑ Felix Teichner, On the sustainability of Roman spatial planning in Pannonia using the example of a settlement chamber at Marcal and Raab. With a contribution by Heike Schneider In: Ute Lohner-Urban, Peter Scherrer (eds.), The upper Danube region 50 v. until 50 AD , Berlin 2015. p. 324.
  14. ↑ Szilvia Biró, Attila Molnár, Christina Salat, Felix Teichner: Geophysical investigations on the territory of Mursella. In: Archaeological investigations in Hungary 2006 , Budapest 2007, Fig. 6
  15. ↑ Felix Teichner, On the sustainability of Roman spatial planning in Pannonia using the example of a settlement chamber at Marcal and Raab. With a contribution by Heike Schneider In: Ute Lohner-Urban, Peter Scherrer (eds.), The upper Danube region 50 v. until 50 AD , Berlin 2015. p. 322.
  16. ↑ Felix Teichner, On the sustainability of Roman spatial planning in Pannonia using the example of a settlement chamber at Marcal and Raab. With a contribution by Heike Schneider In: Ute Lohner-Urban, Peter Scherrer (eds.), The upper Danube region 50 v. until 50 AD , Berlin 2015. p. 324.
  17. ↑ Felix Teichner, On the sustainability of Roman spatial planning in Pannonia using the example of a settlement chamber at Marcal and Raab. With a contribution by Heike Schneider In: Ute Lohner-Urban, Peter Scherrer (eds.), The upper Danube region 50 v. until 50 AD , Berlin 2015. p. 326.