Archaeological sites and areas 

Aquincum

Aquincum grew from a Roman military base (castrum), where an adjacent military town and only 2 kms to the north a civil town developed, flourished by the industrialists, craftsmen and merchants serving the soldiers. It certainly also gave home at some level to the descendants of the Eravisci, as reliefs and written records demonstrate. From the early 120s CE, when the civil town in Aquincum became a municipium, the wealthier Celtic tribal leaders could become members of the city council and some of them even became Roman citizens there (Póczy & Zsidi in Zsidi 2003a). In the changing legions stationed at Aquincum in the 1st and 2nd centuries AD, many of the soldiers came from northern Italy and the western part of the Empire, such as Gallia and Spain, but there are also records on Jerusalem and Egyptian origin. In the late 2nd - first half of the 3rd century CE, a large number of inscribed monuments were left by wealthy people from the eastern provinces, Asia Minor and the Syrian territories.

The cemeteries of Aquincum are numerous, stretching mainly along the main ancient Roads, leading to the military and civil towns (Figure 1). Up to now, mostly small cemetery details and individual burials were examined at Aquincum, such as from the sites of Bécsi road 64 (Vámos 2006), 66 (Vámos 2007; Vámos 2022), Bécsi road 166-172 (Topál 1993), Bécsi road 269 (Topál 1993), Beszterce street 21 (Vámos-Fábián 2020, pp. 203-206), Zápor street 11 (Vámos-Fábián 2022), and San Marco street 33. In the early period of Aquincum, biritual mortuary practices were common. In the 2nd century CE, the rite of cremation spread among the population. Rich anthropological material is available from the 3rd century onward from the civil and military cemeteries. In the 4th century, graves appeared in the formerly abandoned settlement zones. A reason behind this new phenomenon could be the pursuit of safety, i.e. the remaining population felt it was safer to bury their dead in the nearby uninhabited buildings instead of the "official" cemeteries further away (Kaba 1959, Fig. 6; Póczy 1955, pp. 66–74; Topál 2003b, p. 163). At the same time, the explanation may also be proposed that this population no longer adhered to the former traditions, i.e. they did not consider those who lived here previously to be important.

Solva

Celts and Azali Illyrians were the local populations of Solva (Esztergom) in northeast Pannonia, where a castellum was established in the 1st century CE, and rebuilt after a horizon of destruction in the late Roman period (Kelemen 2008). Whereas the records on Azali tribes are only epigraphic and historical, the Celts had dense settlements and left significant material culture in the area (Kelemen 1995, 1999). Solva was an important station of the Roman frontier defense system from the mid-1st century CE until the 430s. Its military camp was built on Castle Hill, and its vicus (civil settlement) was located in the area of the medieval Viziváros and the Royal City. Only a few graves are known of its cemeteries, which were found on Bajcsy Zsilinszky street, in the Bánomi-dűlő and in Eszperanto street.

At Esztergom, Bánomi-dűlő, the garrison of the military camp and their family members were buried on the eastern slope of the Bánomi hill, where 335 late Roman tombs were excavated by Márta H. Kelemen between 1986 and 1990. These tombs formed a separate cemetery within the hundreds (or even 1-2 thousand) of graves once buried in the camp. The cemetery was opened around 330-350 CE, and its use was continuous in the first half of the 5th century CE, based on the finds and the post-interment of the graves throughout the cemetery, although most of the graves date from the second half of the 2nd or mid-4th century CE (Kelemen 2008).

At Esztergom, Kossuth street, the late Roman vicus cemetery was found. The archaeological evidence suggests that the cemetery was first used in the last quarter of the 3rd century CE, with the latest graves dating from the end of the 4th century CE. The cemetery remains suggest that those buried here lived in much more modest conditions than those in the camp cemetery. The cemetery lacks stone cairn tombs and contains minimal gold jewelry. According to Márta H. Kelemen, the cemetery was buried by the descendants of the indigenous population resettled from Várhegy during the Roman occupation. The onion-headed fibulae and the belt buckles and beats suggest that also soldiers were buried here, whose graves can be found throughout the cemetery (Kelemen 2008).

Páty

At Páty, Malom-dűlő a Roman period vicus and a large cemetery 50 m apart was excavated between 1997-1999 by Éva Maróti. The site also included late Celtic remains, and 184 Roman period graves among many later period finds. Altogether 127 graves belonged to the early Roman period, among them 43 are inhumation graves. The late Roman and Hunnic period graves are analyzed in the frame of the ERC HistoGenes project, where the IAG RCH is a beneficiary partner. Based on the vessels and fibulae indicating the ethnicity of the 1-2th century population, and some inscriptions and specific burial rites, the cemetery in Páty may have been buried by the local, continuously Romanising Eraviscus population. This is especially true for the inhumation burials of the early period. The sporadic presence of veteran soldiers’ graves and some Germanic type artifacts dot the cemetery (Ottományi 2019).

Research Methodology

We have organized the research tasks within this project into work packages according to their contributing disciplines. This does not mean the tasks are independent, as we aim to draw interdisciplinary conclusions, formulate research questions, and evaluate results as teams.

Archaeology

The participating archaeologists provide expert support for the project, involving the selection of samples, collecting grave documentation, organizing these into a unified database, evaluating and publishing as-yet-unpublished graves, and jointly interpreting genetic, isotopic, and anthropological results. Museums also play a vital role as partners in presenting results and engaging in public communication.

Anthropology

Approximately 300-450 human remains and their surroundings (their cemeteries) from Aquincum will be examined from a historical anthropological perspective. A part-time anthropologist and colleagues from partner institutions perform anthropological analyses, ranging from collecting skeletal data (sex, age, morphological features, pathological traces) to scientific publication. Comparing anthropological observations with surrounding Roman-era sites and genetic results (pathogens, inherited diseases, genetic relationship systems) is a crucial part of the teamwork.

Isotope Analyses

We plan to conduct approximately 140 stable isotope analyses (δ13C, δ15N) on the same samples using the services of Isotoptech Zrt./ATOMKI in Debrecen. These two stable isotopes provide information about the dietary habits of ancient individuals. The δ15N ratio indicates the role of animal-derived proteins in nutrition and the trophic level of the given organism, while δ13C can suggest the type of plant food consumed. Together, they are instrumental in determining the ratio of terrestrial to aquatic foods and assessing potential malnutrition in individuals.

Genetics

We plan to process human genetic samples selected from nearly 300 graves. Human resources for genetic work are partially provided by the Institute of Archaeogenomics. The entire genetic research infrastructure is available at the Institute of Archaeogenomics, from sample preparation in a clean lab to primary DNA sequencing. Sequencing for deeper coverage will be performed in a service laboratory (aiming for 1-3x full genome coverage if the endogenous DNA ratio is over 30%), which has proven cost-effective based on recent years' practice. For samples yielding a 5-30% endogenous DNA ratio in initial trial sequencing, we employ hybridization capture to enrich 1.4 million SNPs at the whole-genome level (including mitogenomes). Results are processed using the established IT environment developed by the institute's staff (Gerber et al. 2022), implemented in the ELKH Cloud system. The data are evaluated using internationally accepted statistical procedures (e.g., Patterson et al. 2012). However, the research will also seek chromosome segment identities that extend beyond standard population genetic methods. The study of identical segments based on descent (Identity by Descent, IBD) is a burgeoning bioinformatics trend in archaeogenetics that demands high-quality DNA results. Recent laboratory advancements now make it possible to achieve this (Rubinacci et al. 2021, Ringbauer et al. 2023). IBD analyses create a network of distant kinship relationships. The ancient DNA reads obtained will also be processed at the IAG RCH for non-human components, searching for human pathogens from the study period.

Furthermore, on a pilot scale, we plan aDNA analyses of horses and camels, where DNA preservation will dictate the potential for publication. The team is dedicated to combining archaeological and archaeozoological evidence with genomic data, incorporating functional genomics and phenotype reconstruction into our methodology.

Interdisciplinarity

Extra care is taken in constructing an interdisciplinary database that comprehensively presents the collected data and results. While in the first half of the project the disciplines will work on their tasks independently, the final years will concentrate on the joint interpretation and presentation of the findings.