From: george knysh
Message: 64402
Date: 2009-07-23
--- On Wed, 7/22/09, gknysh@... <gknysh@...> wrote:
> GK: The Wikipedia Polish-language article on Przeworsk states
> that this type of burial [flexed ****GK]covers an area "identical
> to that of earlier Celtic settlements" .
But at that time the Celts practised cremation, as mentioned.
GK:Inhumations had never entirely gone out of style it seems.
****GK: I only have a tantalizing reference to and report from a book published in 1991 about the Transcarpathian Latene culture (V.H. Kotyhoroshko, Drevnyaya istoriia Verkhnego Potissja, Uzhhorod, 1991, pp. 143-144 ["The ancient history of the Upper Tysa region", in Russian]. It is cited in ch. 3 of the "Etnichna Istoriia Davnjoji Ukrainy" (the chapter is authored by the noted Ukrainian archaeologist D.N. Kozak) (Kyiv 2000, Institute of Archaeology of the Ukrainian Academy of Sciences, pp.124-125).
Here is what it states (trans. from Ukrainian)
"It is evident that a mixed Celto-Thracian culture emerged in Transcarpathia in the 3rd-1rst cs. BCE. [BTW Ukr. archaeologists use the term "Thracian" to refer to Thracians proper, Geto-Dacians, or northern Thrakoids (GK)]
The result of the influence of the highly developed culture of the Celts was a sharp rise in the quality of the local economy. An illustration of this is the emergence of such exceptional ("mohutni" GK] (for the epoch) centers for the extraction and transformational utilization of iron as Halish-Lovachka, Novo-Klynovo, and of extremely productive ceramic workshops. There is much evidence for the coexistence of the arriving migrant [the Celts GK] and the local ["Thracian" GK] populations. Burial customs also become mixed. In certain Celtic burials one finds Kushtanovite ceramic ["Kushtanovite": the name of the "Thracian" culture of Transcarpathia before the arrival of the Celts in the early 3rd c. BCE (GK)]Sometimes Celtic burials are performed in accordance with local traditions [I think this means crenmation GK]. And contrarywise, inhumation burials with weapons increase in Kushtanovite cemeteries, as is characteristic for the [Transcarpathian] Celts.
All this allows us to affirm that in the Upper Tysa region there was a process of Latenization of the Thracians through cultural and ethnic mutual assimilation. It is evident that the local Thracian and the immigrating Celtic population created a certain rather stable symbiosis which lasted for approximately 200 years."
The book states that this culture was largely destroyed during the Burebista expansion of the 50's BCE. Its neighbour to the northwest was the Przeworsk culture.****