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On the significance of the entire Certosa fibula from the cult place on Monte di Medea in Friuli: its typological characteristics, dating and the unusual two-part construction

Ana MARIĆ

Arheološki vestnik 66, 2015

Review

In Biba Teržan’s 1976 basic study of Certosa fibulae (Arheološki vestnik 27, 317 ss), she assigned specimens with three transverse ribs on the head, where the central one is wider than the lateral ones, to type VII. Based on differences in size, massiveness, scheme, and decoration she was able to divide the typeinto nine variants. A special group within them is formed by the variants d, e and f, which all have the highest part of the bow closer to the foot. In describing variant d Teržan (1976, 325) only noted that it incorporates relatively large fibulae and did not mention any other characteristics. But many fibulae of variants e and f are also similarly large. She mentioned that these two variants differ from variant d by their ornament and the cross-section of the bow. According to her, variant e normally has a bow with a segmental cross-section (though in fact such a cross-section also often appears on fibulae of variant d), and variant f normally has a band-shaped bow. They both have two eyelets on the rhombically enlargedpart of the bow and a triangular motif on the foot

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button. In addition variant e should have an ornament of transversal incisions on the back of the bow (in reality it can have transversal incisions, a single ora double dotted line or two parallel lines) and incised lateral ribs on the three-part thickening on the head (in reality only some specimens have decorated lateral ribs).

Teržan 1976

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Teržan has assigned 11 fibulae from seven sites to variant VIId. Of these only three were published until1976, the fibula from Monte di Medea and two fibulae form Šmihel pod Nanosom. Two years later Janez Dular published all three fibulae from Podzemelj (Dular 1978, Pl. 4: 2, 9, 14), while later also the fibula from grave Sz 1816 at Most na Soči (Teržan, Lo Schiavo, Trampuž-Orel 1984, Pl. 172: H1) and the fibula from Bodrež (Guštin 1991, 12, Pl. 40: 1) were presented. Teržan did not date variant VIId nor did she map its distribution (cf. Fig. 42 on p. 371).

Teržan 1976

The redaction of Arheološki vestnik made some mistakes in publishing the master work of Teržan. Typological descriptions of the types and variants were not translated and only some types of fibulae were presented in the drawings. Type VII was presented in such a way (Fig. 3 on p. 326), but the views from above are missing, which would have allowed the ornaments of the foot and the bow to be more clearly visible.

Since 1976 the number of the fibulae belonging to variant VIId has increased in comparison with Teržan'slist (1976, 328, d). First the fibulae from Osor on

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the island of Cres and from Grobnik above Rijeka in Croatia were published, and after 2000 one fibula fromGurina in Carinthia, four from the cemetery of Socerb above Trieste and several specimens from Friuli and Carnia in Italy were published.

It is surprising that in the literature the great majority of these fibulae have been wrongly categorized primarily as fibulae of variants VIIe and VIIf.

For example, Peter Jablonka from Austria has classified a well preserved fibula from Gurina in the Gailtal in Carinthia (2001, 317, Pl. 80: 23), which has a narrow bow with a segmental cross-section and noornament on the top of the bow and on the foot button,as variant VIIf (ibidem, 114, Certosafibeln, 232, map 5). Alessandra Giumlia-Mair (2003, 11, Fig. 3) from Italy has assigned to the same variant the fibula fromgrave 77 of the Misincinis cemetery at Paularo in Carnia (Vitri 2001, 44, Fig. 7), which by its size, form, ornament and the two-part construction is equal to the fibula from Monte di Medea, already correctly assigned by Teržan to variant VIId! But not only the Austrian and the Italian archaeologists have problems with the correct typological determination of the Certosa fibulae of type VII.

In 2012 Sneža Tecco Hvala has wrongly assigned to variant VIIf the fibula from grave 2/72 at Preloge on Magdalenska gora in Dolenjska (Tecco Hvala, Dular, Kocuvan 2004, Pl. 59: D1), which has transversal incisions or dots between two parallel lines on the back of the bow with a segmental cross-section as wellas incised lateral ribs on the head, and therefore undoubtedly belongs to variant VIIe (Tecco Hvala 2012,

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251, Fig. 94: 19 and 95, VIIf, the last line). MartinaBlečić Kavur also incorrectly classified numerous fragments of the fibulae of variant VIIe from the siteKavanela at Osor on the island of Cres as fibulae of variant VIIf in her dissertation! If some archaeologist incapable of a critical judgement, made a new study on the fibulae of variant VIIf based only on the classifications in the literature, it would result in total confusion.

Gurina near Dole (German Dellach) in Gailtal in Carinthia, Austria (after Jablonka 2001)

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Gurina near Dole (German Dellach) in Gailtal in Carinthia, Austria (after Jablonka 2001)

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Misincinis in Paularo in Carnia, Italy, grave 77 (after Vitri 2001)

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Giumlia-Mair 2003

Since there is major confusion regarding the Certosa fibulae of variant VIId in the literature, I gave my doctoral student Ana Marić, curator of the National Museum of Bosnia and Herzegovina in Sarajevo, in the first year of her study at the Graduate School of the University of NovaGorica (http://www.ung.si/en/study/graduate-school/study/3HUM/course/141247/archeological-analyses-of-iron-age-non-ceramic-finds/) the task of writing a paper dealing with this issue. The task was to assign to variant VIId of the Certosa fibulae all those specimens that belong to it, quote all its typological characteristics, make a distribution map, establish its dating, and also point out the Certosa fibulae with two-part construction.

The paper, submitted for publication in the journal Arheološki vestnik, is divided into several chapters. The starting-point is focused on the only entire Certosa fibula from the final Hallstatt period cult place on Monte di Medea above Medea in Friuli (cf. S. Rutar, Poknežena grofija Goriška in Gradiščanska 1, 1892, 15: Medejskihribček; Letopis SAZU 39, 1988, 45: Medejski hrib; in Italian Monte di Medea or Colle di Medea), made of twoparts. In the following chapters the author exhaustively deals with the typology of variants d, e and f of type VII, with the distribution and dating ofvariant VIId and also briefly discusses the two-part Certosa fibulae.

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Certosa fibula of variant VIId from the cult place on Monte di Medea above Medea in Friuli, Italy (after Furlani 1973)

Marić 2015, Fig. 2

In the chapter History of research Ana Marić presents the site on Monte di Medea, explored in the year 1968,and its most probable explanation.

In the next chapter (Certosa fibulae of type VII) she first exhaustively presents the typological observations of Biba Teržan in the year 1976, which isespecially important, because they were only presentedin the Slovenian language in the original publication.Then she quotes all the main typological characteristics of the variant VIId. The bow is never band-shaped and the fibulae are poorly ornamented, since they do not have eyelets on the rhombically widened top of the bow, and have an undecorated foot button and no ornament on the lateral ribs on the

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head. After that she mentions the differences in ornament between the variants e and f (regarding this Teržan only wrote that the fibulae of variant f are very close to variant e, especially concerning the ornament). Among others things, she draws our attention to the fact that fibulae of variant VIIe sometimes have a tremolo ornament (mostly two, rarely four tremolo lines; cf. the fibulae from Dernazzacco, Kranj, Magdalenska gora, Socerb, Nezakcij and Osor) onthe flat upper part of the foot. On fibulae of variantVIIf the flat upper part of the foot is often undecorated, while those specimens of this variant, found by the Duchess of Mecklenburg near Golek pri Vinici in Bela krajina, bear a «-motif. The latter also do not have a band-shaped or even a slightly curved bow, but instead have a solid bow with a triangular cross-section (cf. S. Gabrovec, Arheološki vestnik 17, 1966, Pl. 14: 4).

Marić 2015, Fig. 3

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In the chapter on the new finds and an updated distribution map, Ana Marić exhaustively presents the fibulae of variant VIId that were published after BibaTeržan’s 1976 study. She relies on her own observations, since in the literature all these fibulae were determined inaccurately (a Certosa fibula) or incorrectly (a Certosa fibula of variant VIIe or VIIf). She also presents three other specimenswith two-part construction in addition to the fibula from Monte di Medea.

She based her dating of variant VIId to the Negova phase or the Sv. Lucija IIc phase on the presence of one specimen at the narrowly dated cult place on Montedi Medea, and on the fact that three such fibulae appear among the finds from the burial mounds near Podzemelj in Bela krajina, which cannot be later than the end of the Hallstatt period, and one in the ratherpoor grave 77 of the Misincinis cemetery in Paularo inCarnia, which belongs to the last phase of the burial at this cemetery. She could also mention here the fibula from grave Sz 1816 at Most na Soči, which is also rather modest, but considering the duration of the cemetery, excavated by Joseph Szombathy from Vienna and Carlo Marchesetti from Trieste, cannot be later than the Sv. Lucija IIc phase.

In the last chapter the author briefly presents the phenomenon of the Certosa fibulae with two-part construction, to which belong the fibula from Monte diMedea in Friuli and its twin sister from Paularo in Carnia. I discovered it in July 2012 when I was examining fibulae of variant VIIf from the Iapodian cemeteries Jezerine and Ribić in the Una Valley, whichare almost all without the spring and the pin. This isof course the consequence of the fact that they were

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not made of bronze like the bow and the foot, but rather were made of iron!

Numerous Certosa fibulae from Lika in Croatia and fromGolek pri Vinici in Bela krajina were also made out ofbronze (the bow and the foot) and iron (the spring with pin). This is therefore a specialty of the workshops in the region of the Iapodes and the Colapiani. Some other Certosa fibulae from Lika and Golek pri Vinici have two-part construction as well, but both parts are of bronze: the bow and the foot presumably of leaded bronze suitable for casting, and the spring with pin of common bronze, which ensures the necessary elasticity.

The two-part late Certosa fibulae from two different bronze alloys are also known from Notranjska, Kras, Friuli and Carnia. On the other hand, if we look at the relatively numerous late Certosa fibulae that werereally found on Magdalenska gora (that is those, kept in the museums of Vienna and Ljubljana), and the fibulae of type X from the graves at Most na Soči in the Soča Valley, we do not see any sign of two-part construction. As the author mentions in note 3, I shared my unexpected discovery with her and we continued to research this previously overlooked phenomenon together. One of the more important results of the research is the realization that the two-part late Certosa fibulaemade of bronze and iron or of two different bronze alloys that were published by Hugh Hencken in 1978 as the grave goods from graves excavated on Magdalenska gora by the Duchess of Mecklenburg, in reality undoubtedly originate from the cemetery at Stražni dolnear Golek pri Vinici in Bela krajina.

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Jezerine in Pritoka near Bihać, Bosnia and Herzegovina (after Marić 1968)

Trošmarija near Ogulin, Croatia (after Težak-Gregl 1981)

Golek pri Vinici in Bela krajina and not Magdalenska gora (after Hencken 1978)

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Golek pri Vinici in Bela krajina and not Magdalenska gora (after Hencken 1978)

Zuglio in Carnia, Italy (after Degasperi, Vitri 2004)

The five chapters described are followed by the catalogue of all known Certosa fibulae of variant VIIdand the bibliography, compiled in accordance with the guidelines for the contributors of the journal Arheološki vestnik.

The paper is properly illustrated by eight figures, which present a selection of metal and glass finds from the cult place on Monte di Medea (Fig. 1), the fibula of variant VIId from this site (Fig. 2), some typical specimens of the variants VIId, VIIe and VIIf (Fig. 3), a selection of fibulae of variant VIId (Figs. 5 and 6), and some two-part late Certosa fibulae of types VII, X, XI and XII (Fig. 8). Two mapsshow the distribution of the fibulae of variant VIId. The first shows the distribution according to the state of research in 1976 (Fig. 4) and the second is an updated map based on known specimens in 2014 (Fig. 7).

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The paper, related not only to the Hallstatt period in Slovenia, but also inthe neighbouring countries (Croatia, Austria and Italy), represents an original and important contribution to the research on the Certosa fibulae and therefore is certainly worthy of publication in the main Slovenian archaeological journal Arheološki vestnik.

The text was proof-read by Adrienne Frie from University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee (USA).

Ljubljana, January 16th, 2015 Dr. Dragan Božič