Feasting with music? A musical instrument and its context from the later 5th millennium BC Hungary

Abstract

Feasts, occasions of festive commensality, play a prominent role in every human society, and prehistory was no exception. An assemblage suggesting a deposition act performed after feasting came to light from a closed context on a Copper Age site dating from the later 5th millennium BC in the north-westerly region of the Carpathian Basin. One of the pits among the many similar features lying between the houses of the settlement investigated at Mosonszentmiklós-Pálmajor, Hungary, contained a remarkable set of finds: the pit’s floor was covered with a greasy, blackish organic layer, onto which were deposited cattle long bones and intact vessels, one interpreted as a drum, alongside an almost intact clay horn, which can still be played as a musical instrument today. The assessment of the musical instrument(s), the other finds and of the overall context was undertaken together with the evaluation of the radiocarbon dates and the botanical analysis of the soil samples taken from the vessels, which strongly indicated that the assemblage can be interpreted as a deposit made after feasting.