Archaeological site of Bolnica in Paracin and its importance for the prehistory of the Central Morava Region: A contribution in chronology and horizontal and vertical stratigraphy

Abstract

The paper presents the horizontal and vertical stratigraphy of the site of Bolnica in Paracin, based on both earlier and the latest archaeological excavations and the material which had been collected for decades by the Hometown Museum in Paracin, as a result of the construction works connected with the constant urbanisation of the area. The presented archaeological material is attributed to a period from the Early Neolithic to the so-called Dacian La T?ne, meaning the 2nd century AD. One of the subjects discussed in this paper is the possibility that the sites of Bolnica and Motel Slatina, in fact, represent one large site, which was artificially divided by the E 75 highway and the Serbian Glass Factory. The comparative analysis, which encompassed the sites positioned on the right bank of the Velika Morava River, showed that this is one of the sites with the most independent chronological sequences in the Central Morava Region. Likewise, the importance of this site as a strategic point and an important intersection on the route from the Danube River to the Central Balkans, and further towards the south and east is underlined. Finally, we analysed the appearance of Dacian material culture during the 1st and the 2nd century AD and compared the occurrence of certain forms and decorations with relevant sites in present-day Romania. The paper cautiously suggests that the Dacian material culture represents traces of the deportation of 100,000 Transdanubians to the territory of Moesia by the legate Silvanus Aelianus, possibly between 61 AD and 64 AD, during the reign of Emperor Nero, which has been partially confirmed by new archaeological excavations at the site of Glozdak-Lidl during 2018.