Słowiańskie osadnictwo w fazie plemiennej i wczesnopaństwowej (VII/VIII–XIII wiek) / Slavic settlement in the Tribal and Early State phase (7th/8th–13th centuries)

Abstract

After the Early Slavic period a number of changes took place, which was manifested, among others, in the construction of strongholds – fortified seats of local power. This stage of Slavic development, lasting approximately 200 years from the turn of the 7th and 8th century on, is called the Tribal phase. At that time, the areas of western Lesser Poland belonged to the Vistulan tribe. Their central seat was the stronghold on Wawel Hill in Kraków. At the end of the 10th century the Piasts began to play an active military and political role in the Vistula River basin. Their successful expansion gave rise to the Early State phase. After 966, as Christianity progressed, inhumation replaced cremation as the burial rite. The oldest row-arranged cemeteries were founded on the upper Vistula from the turn of the 10th and 11th centuries. They were used until end of the 12th century, or longer. Two such cemeteries were examined in the study area, in Wawrzeńczyce and Stręgoborzyce. They were abandoned with the consolidation of the parish network and the establishment of church cemeteries in the 13th century. Material culture of the Tribal phase – besides native production – yielded artifacts indicating contacts with areas south of the Carpathians, with the nomadic Avars and, after their fall, with Hungarians.