A New Framework For Approaching Dacian Identity

.....
A NEW FRAMEWORK FOR APPROACHING DACIAN IDENTITY

The Burial Contribution 1
CataIin Nicolae POPA

PhD student, University of Cambridge, UK
pcatalinn@yahoo.com
Keywords: La Tene, Romania, Dacians, burials, identity
The last two decades have witnessed an increased interest in the identity of Europe's Iron Age I
,
inhabitants. A heated debate was launched especially over terms like 'Celtic' and 'Celticity: Many of the
problems appear to have arisen after the Venice exhibition in 1991, entitled "The Celts, the origins of
Europe': which also led to the publication of a volume that integrated studies on the Celts from all the
regions of the continent (MOSCATI1991). Both the exhibition and the volume have been interpreted
by some researchers, most of them coming from the British school of archaeologi, as an attempt to
give historical foundation to the European Union by creating an artificial unity in the Late Iron Age.
The debate became especially animated in the pages of the Antiquity journal, where COLLIS(1997) and
JAMES(1998), on the one side, and Ruth and Vincent MEGAW(1996; 1998) on the other, argued against
one another as to whether archaeologists should use terms like 'Celtic' or 'Celticity: While there is still
no clear consensus, the researchers from France, where studies on the La Tene have an especially strong
tradition, still use the terms freely (AuDouzE 1992; BucHsENscHuTz 2007; FICHTL2000; KRUTA2000)3
and, even in Britain, Hill's and Collis's ideas seem to have come heavily under attack in the last two years
(DAVIS2008; KARL2008). I personally consider that there is enough evidence, coming from both the
archaeological record and textual sources, to safely assume the existence of large groups of people that
can be generally referred to using the word 'Celtic: Nevertheless I do not think that they necessarily
regarded themselves as sharing the same ethnic identity.
The Celts were not however, the only people inhabiting Europe in the Late Iron Age. Toward the
east, living in the region which can be roughly defined as the Carpathian Basin, one can find the Dacians
or Getae. This region was not included in the debate about the unity of Europe in prehistory as studies
on the identity and ethnicity of these people are virtually non-existent. This is the gap which I will try
to fill through this paper: using the data from burials, I aim to produce conclusions on how the Dacian
people perceived themselves and how they portrayed their image to others; and whether they empha-
sised ethnic, regional or local identity.
In order to achieve my goal I have structured the paper in three main parts, enveloped by the
current introduction and the final conclusions. The first part will deal with the past approaches to the
Dacian burials, that have proven to be, as I will point out, quite unproductive; additionally I will give
an outline of the current ideas on identity and its implementation in archaeology, ideas which I will be
using in the paper. The second part will deal with the methodology which I consider to be appropriate
for the interpretation of burials, much of it being based on the works of people like Parker Pearson and
1. This paper represents the outcome of my MPhil studies at the University of Cambridge.
2. Especially through people like COLLIS(1996; 2003) or HILL(1995; 2006).
3. Even though there are people like DITLER(1994) who slightly contest the wide use of the term Celtic.
Iron Age Communities in the Carpathian Basin,2010,p. 395-423

396 I CATALIN NICOLAE POPA
Lucy.On the other hand, I will argue that those methods are not exactly the best way of approaching the
Dacian burials as they need to be modified to a significant degree in order to produce the best results;
the changes imply regarding the burials not just as the end result of a funerary ritual, but as accounting
for more complex elements, which leads to a need to integrate them in the more general phenomena
occurring in the Dacian world. The third part represents the implementation of the methodology on the
actual body of data. I will analyse the burials globally, pointing out general patterns which are notice-
able when examining the spatial or chronological distribution4, as well as discuss some of the artefacts
occurring in the graves and draw some condusjons by broadly comparing the burials to one another.
Additionally, I will examine in greater detail a number of burials from which I will attempt to extract the
ideas about identity that are contained within them.
Before moving on to the first of the three main parts, I consider it necessary however to give a
short introduction about who actually were the Dacians, where and when they lived, and the broad ideas
which circulate in traditional archaeological literature about them.
Who were the Dacians?

The Dacians, or better yet, the Getae, represent the northern branch of the Thracians that became
visible archaeologically as a separate group of people after approximately the 81hcentury BC According
to the ancient authors and, to a certain degree, the archaeological evidence, the region that they occu-
pied is broadly delimited by: the Dniester (or Nistru)
river to the east; the Tisza River to the west; the
northern Carpathians to the north, and the Balkans
to the south (GOSTAR-LICA1984, 19) (Fig. 1).
The first information that we have about them
comes from Herodotus who mentions them in rela-
Pannoman tion to the Persian king Darius' expedition against the
pbl1\5
Scythians, as the Getae where the only people among
the Thracians that did not surrender to his army and
had to be defeated in battle. After this point we start
having more mention of them, even though they only
B~.II:k start to attract the actual interest of the ancient authors
Sc:a in the 151century BC, when many of the Getic tribes
were united under a single rule by king Burebista who
- -- - - got involved in the civil war in Rome between Caesar
Fig. 1.Maximumexpansionof the Dacians. and Pompey. Burebista's state was split however in
four and then five smaller kingdoms after his disappearance in approximately 44 BC only to be followed
by Decebalus's Dacian state, towards the end of the 151 century AD. The last Dacian kingdom was defeated
in two wars against the Romans, in 101-102 and 105-106, after which the Roman province of Dacia was
established, the point which is used to mark the end of the Iron Age and start of the Classical period
(PARVAN 1926; CRI~AN1977;GOSTAR-LICA1984;VULPE-ZAHARIADE 1987; CRI~AN1993) (Fig. 2).
This paper does not deal with the existence of the Dacians in the entire Iron Age. It aims only
to discuss the situation during the so-called <classicDacian civilisation' which can be dated from the
middle of the 2ndcentury BC to the Daco-Roman wars, corresponding to the LT C2-D (GLODARIU-
IAROSLAVSCHI 1979; CRI~AN1993). Moreover, I will be focussing only on the area that can be regarded
as the nucleus5of the Dacian culture, which roughly corresponds to the territory of present day Romania6
(Figure 3, 4).
I consider that the issue of the name of these northern Thracians also needs clarifying. The
first name, Getae, is the ethnonym that was employed by the Greek authors to name these people as
far back as Herodotus, while the Latin writers, starting with Caesar in the 151century BC, preferred
the term Dacian (FLoREA-SiRBu1997, 13). There are nevertheless problems figuring out if the Getae
4. These will be based in part on the remarks that I have made in my undergraduate dissertation (POPA2008).
5. Thedefinitionofthe nucleusof the Daciancivilisationbymodern archaeologists(CRI~AN 1977;PETRE2004) is basedboth
on the ancient texts and on the massive concentration of material culture in the region.
6. This fact is in reality not that important as there are very few Dacian burials located outside Romania and also because
after the 1st century BC the Roman Empire already starts to install itself on the right side of the lower Danube.
A New Framework for Approaching Dacian Identity. The Burial Contribution I 397
northern Celts
Lysimachus Burebista's first direct battle
Thracian
(Macedonian 'disappear' between the Dacian
people and Dacian kingdom
basileus) defeated state and the Roman
separate by Dromichetaes power IS
themselves established in Empire; Decebalus
(Getic ruler)
from southern Transilvania comes to power
Thracians
101-102;
105-106 AD
"incrementa Romans control

Darius's Celts enter and Dacorum per the right side of
expedition; Rubobosten the Danube
take control of
first mention of regem " (Trogus Roman-Dacian
Getae parts of
Transilvania Pompei us) wars
Fig. 2. Important events in the existence of the Dacians.
Fig.3. Geographical map of Romania Fig. 4. The regions of Romania.

with important features marked.
and the Dacians are the same people, as Strabo mentions that the Getae are the ones living towards the
Black Sea and the east, while the Dacians occupy the western part, towards Germany and the source
of the Danube (DANA2007); he further writes that they spoke the same language.7 Most authors have
interpreted Strabo's text as the Getae and Dacians being the same population, with only slight regional
differences (VULPE-ZAHARIADE 1987).8
The discussion gets much more complicated when one considers how the two names are used
in the Romanian archaeological literature. In general the authors prefer to use the term Geto- Dacian,
a modern invention as STROBERL (1998) accurately remarked, referring to an ethnic entity without any
attempt at supporting evidence. Most of the artefacts are assigned an ethnic dimension and are inter-
preted as reflecting the presence of the Geto- Dacians in whatever context they are found (LOCKYEAR
2004). It is unlikely that the situation will change anytime in the future, even though there have been
recent Romanian studies which have started to raise doubts about the idea of a great Geto- Dacian ethnic
unity (SPANU2002). In this paper I will use preferentially the term Dacian, but through it I only mean
7. There have also been interesting studies on the origin of the name Dacian. The most widely accepted ideas is that proposed
by EUADE(1959) who considers that it comes from the Phrigian daos meaning wolf. This point of view has been contested
however in the last decade (DANA2000).
8. For a more thorough discussion on the employment of the term Getae and Dacian by the ancient authors see PETRE2004
and STROBEL1998.
....
the northern Thracian people that roughly inhabited the territory of modern Romania.9 Therefore the
term is employed conventionally, without attaching any ethnical connotation, which allows me to avoid
the risk of compromising my quest for identity.
I. Past approaches to Dacian burials

1.1. Burials
There are very few burials which can be attributed to the Dacians in the period that I am inter-
ested in. I have counted just about 50, an important number of which were only identified as such or
discovered in the last 15 to 20 years. The mysterious phenomenon, that led to the 'disappearance' of the
graves, and which affects a large area of Central and South-East Europe (SPANU2002, 103), has been
linked to a radical change in religious beliefs. While it is only possible to speculate about a funerary rite
that leaves no archaeological traces, it seems likely that the Dacians practised either exposure (SiRBU
1993) or cremation, with the remains scattered in fields or in rivers (VULPE-ZAHARIADE 1987,80).
Consequently, most authors just ignore the few burials that have been dated to the Late La Tene,
choosing instead to state the obvious, that we are uncertain of how the Dacians dealt with their dead
(CRI~AN1977; GOSTAR-LICA1984; VULPE-ZAHARIADE 1987). When one starts browsing through the
Romanian archaeological journals it is possible to observe however occasional articles on Dacian buri-
als, but the large majority of them represent only the publication of the archaeological material that was
found in one grave, sometimes followed by a short and inconclusive discussion (VULPE1976; CRI~AN
1980; MOGA1982; CIUGUDEAN-CIUGUDEAN 1993).10Besides the previously mentioned studies, there
are also some volumes that do in fact give attention to the funerary discoveries. These are usually studies
that aim at presenting all the aspects of the Dacian civilisation from one particular region (TURCU1979;
COSTEA2002; GHEORGHIU2005). While they contain lists with the graves that have been identified in
that area, with the inventory and the most probable dating being mentioned, they are never followed by
an actual analysis of those discoveries or by their integration into other aspects of Dacian society.
Finally there are two volumes which deal specificallywith the funerary discoveries from Romania
in the Late Iron Age. The first one was written by PROTASE(1971) and is aimed at listing all the Dacian
burials dated both before and after the Roman conquest. While the author's effort is laudable, the vol-
ume contains a very large number of finds which either cannot be verified, due to the lack of accurate
publication, or do not actually have to do with the funerary phenomenon (e.g. the case of the pits from
Moigrad). Hence the study suffers from a lack of proper research on the nature of those discoveries,
which unfortunately makes it virtually useless in most cases.
SiRBU'S(1993) work however does not suffer from the same problem. The author has done an
excellent job at bringing together all the finds that relate to the Dacian funerary record and which can
be validated. Moreover, he has integrated these into a larger discussion on ritual practices, thus includ-
ing the human sacrifices or the finds of human bones in non-funerary contexts, and expanded the area
of research by also presenting the finds coming from cultural groups with an important Germanic or
Celtic influence (the Daco-Scordisc group from Oltenia, and the Lipita group from northern Moldova).
Even though the study is becoming outdated because of the finds that have been brought to light since its
publication, Sirbu has continued to publish articles and volumes in which new discoveries are published
and integrated within the larger body of data (SiRBUETAL. 1999; SiRBU2006a; SiRBU2006b; SiRBUET
AL. 2007; SiRBu-ARsENEscu 2006). Additionally, he has published a volume which aims at creating a
common terminology when examining Dacian burials (SiRBU2003), and which I am employing in the
current paper. Despite the impressive studies that he is producing, I think there are two major issues
with his work. Firstly, even though Sirbu acknowledges that these burials are not representative of the
way the Dacians dealt with their dead, he unfortunately treats them as such. He uses them as just any
other database on burials, inferring from them the social position of the deceased and the meaning
behind the funerary inventory, forgetting the special character of the burials. Additionally there is also
9. Nonetheless I will also refer to other northern Thracian tribes, such as the Tribali or Moesi who lived south of the lower
Danube (RUSTOIU2002).
10. I must admit however that there are a couple of articles in which there is an attempt to fit the discovery into the more
general Dacian funerary phenomenon or some that attempt to integrate the mortuary practices into their larger context
(BABE~ 1988; RUSTOIU ET AL. 2001; $PANU 2002).
-. -
A New Frameworkfor Approaching Dacian Identity. The Burial Contribution I 399
the problem inherent in almost all Romanian archaeology that all the interpretations are made with the
belief that the Dacians (Geto- Dacians) are regarded as forming a unitary ethnic group.ll
In brief, the burials from the territory of Romania dated to the Late La Tene have been usually
given little or no attention at all. What is more, the few studies that have actually attempt to create a list
with all the funerary finds have either been done in a totally unsatisfactory manner, or been marked by
preconceived ideas.
1.2.Identity
Identity can be defined as the essence of who the individual is, or who the group is in relation to
larger social contexts; it defines what is unique about the individual and about the group (WELLS1998,
242). Closely related to it, and usually employed together, are the terms ethnicity and ethnic identity,
which represents the aspect of a person's self-conceptualization which results from identification with a
broader group in opposition to others on the basis of perceived cultural differentiation and/or common
descent (JONES1997).
The fields of archaeology and anthropology have employed the term identity on a regular basis.
Its use throughout the twentieth century has varied considerably, and this variation can be linked to
the three theoretical schools of archaeology: culture-historian, processualist and post-processualist
(TRIGGER2006).
In the culture-historian period, while there were usually no works that dealt directly with identity
and ethnicity, the concepts were employed extensively in archaeological studies. The general idea was
that archaeological cultures corresponded to ethnically distinct groups of people, leading to the image of
a prehistoric landscape populated by monolithic cultural entities that gradually evolved in time. The two
main authors who introduced and developed these concepts were Kossina and Childe (JONES1997),12
As the ideas about archaeological cultures changed due to the attacks of BINFORD(1962; 1968),
so did the perspectives on identity. BARTH(1969) introduced an entirely new way of thinking about eth-
nicity, which has been named "the instrumentalist theoretical approach" (JONES1996;GRAVES-BROWN-
JONES1996; JONES1997). The two main concepts that he introduced where that ethnic identities are
formed and exist through the active maintenance of boundaries, and that individuals continually shift
their identities so as to best suit their economic and social interests.13Barth's ideas were, and still are,
highly influential and there are hardly"any studies on identity nowadays which do not quote his work.
Actually, the 'instrumentalist view' is still popular and in use today (WELLS1998; COHEN2000; WELLS
2007), even though slight adjustments have been made to the initial concepts (BARTH2000).
With the birth of post-processualism and the rise of ideas about the subjectivity and relativity
of archaeological knowledge, new ways of thinking about identity were also introduced. The end result
is that there appears to be no clear-cut way of getting to ethnicity through archaeology, each author
choosing to build their own framework in their studies. The general trend is however to use BOURDIEU'S
(1977) theory of practice by linking the formation and expression of identity to the habitus (JONES1996;
JONES1997; JONES1999; HAKENBECk2004; BABIC2006; DfAZ-ANDREU2006). Thus identity is built
using the same principles that are active within the habitus, and just like them, is constructed and rein-
forced through everyday practice. Furthermore, since material culture shapes and is itself shaped by the
same governing principles, and at the same time represents one of the means through which identity is
manifested, it is possible to study the ethnicity of past people by examining the overlapping patterns that
result from the archaeological record. 14 The general rule is that all these elements vary from one context
to the other, as the expression of identity is modified according to the social principles which are active
11. The ethnic character of the artifacts appears unquestioned. Moreover, there is even a subtle feel in his works that he is
somehow trying to justify the true character of the Geto- Dacian ethnicity.
12. The Eastern European schools remain very much tributary to this approach. Hence, in their view, the essence of the ethnos
is constituted by very real cultural and linguistic components which comprise the 'inner integrity' of a group's identity
(GRAvEs-BRawN-JoNEs 1996).
13. It should be added that within the 'instrumentalist school' the direct relationship between material culture and ethnicity
is questioned to a certain degree, but not denied.
14. The fundamental problem in accessing ethnicity purely through material culture is that objects can no longer be consid-
ered simple ethnic signifiers, but they can have ethnic significance; however this significance exists only within a known
and communicable frame of reference (HAKENBECK 2004b, 3).
in that particular situation. There is however a problem linked to the construction of ethnicity which has
not been given an answer yet and that has led to the splitting into two groups of the researchers. Most
authors consider that the formation of an ethnic identity is a subjective phenomenon, that it is built on
the similarities that one has with the other members of a group (SHENNAN1989; JONES1996; GRAVES-
BROWN1996; JONES1999; Lucy 2006). In contrast, partly inheriting the ideas of the 'instrumentalist
theory: some think that it is the product of the marking of difference and exclusion, rather than the sign
of an identical, naturally-constituted unity (HALL1996). Whatever the answer might be, it is quite clear
that when working with ethnicity one needs to bear in mind that identity markers signal both sameness
and difference at the same time.
All in all, the subject of identity appears to have given rise to important polemics that will prob-
ably remain unsolved indefinitely. In the mean time however, one should not hold back from approach-
ing ethnicity; it is just necessary to leave aside any preconceived ideas that one might have a,bout the
topic and take into account all the elements that previous authors have signalled.
II. Approaching the Dacian burials

I aim in this part to construct the methodology that I believe represents the best way to approach
the Dacian burials. To achieve my goal, I will depart from the existing literature on funerary rituals
and adapt those ideas so that they can be utilised in this particular case. I will thus describe the general
context of the Dacian funerary discoveries so that their unique character can be understood, leading to
the need for a unique approach. It should be noted also that the ultimate objective is to get a model that
can give as much information as possible about identity. This can mean that some alternative implica-
tions, such as those relating to some specific religious practices, may be at some points intentionally
overlooked.
II.1. Interpreting burials

The archaeology of burials is a very distinct form of archaeology having its own rules that one
should constantly be aware of. It is important to remember that death, along with birth or marriage, rep-
resents one of the major events in the existence of a person. Death is a moment when our attitudes to the
body are presented most clearly and prominently, often in ways which are very different to body treat-
ment in everyday life (PARKERPEARSON1999a, 58). Therefore, even though it may occur on a relatively
regular basis in a community, the passing of each individual is given great attention. The burials are the
result of a very elaborate ritual that starts with the death of the individual and ends with the placing of
the body, or of the cremated remains, in the ground; sometimes the ritual may continue for some time
afterwards. The provision of a final resting place for someone's mortal remains is generally a carefully
thought through procedure which may have taken, months or even years to plan and execute, making
the burial a deeply significant act imbued with meaning (PARKERPEARSON1999b, 5). Thus the funerary
ritual is a highly structured event when people are expected to know how to behave; a specific range of
resources, for instance, phrases, bodily movements, and material symbols, are expected to be mobilised
in ways appropriate to each group of individuals taking part in a funeral (MIZOGUCHI1992,40).
Various meanings linked to different aspects of the deceased's existence, like rank, social condi-
tion, occupation, age, gender, ethnicity, etc. may be suggested during the funerary ceremony. All, some,
or none of these may be singled out through the type of funerary rite (inhumation/cremation), the
position of the body (or the way the cremated remains are placed), the type of grave (flat/tumular), the
position of the grave (isolate/in a cemetery; central/marginal), the funerary inventory and the position
of the grave goods to the deceased's body/remains and to one-another, the food offerings15,and the list
could go on. For instance, in a very rudimentary interpretation, the placing of weapons within a grave is
highly likely to signal the martial prowess of the deceased.
But burials tell a much more complicated and elaborated story than just who the deceased had
been in life; this is because funerary rites are actually much more about the living than they are about
the dead (MIZOGUCHI1992). For some time it was believed by archaeologists that the form and struc-
15. PARKERPEARSON(1999a) has shown for example that a commonly used mark of social differentiation throughout the
British Iron Age may have been the totemic significance of the pig as a high-status feasting food; thus the placing of meat
offerings coming from these animals in graves was a clear sign of the social position of that individual.
A New Frameworkfor Approaching Dacian Identity, The Burial Contribution I 401
~.lrewhich characterised the mortuary practices of any society were conditioned by the form and the
.:omplexity of the organisational characteristics of the society itself; changes or variability in either form
m structure had to take into account the limiting or determining effects exerted on these practices by
the nature of the organisational properties of the society (BINFORD1971, 23). These ideas have been
however proven to be inexact and argued against by people like PARKERPEARSON(1999a). Nevertheless,
the observation that funerary rituals belong to a large extent to the domain of the living, and hence give
much information on the nature of societies, still holds and to get access to those particular meanings it
'."-'asnecessary for archaeologists to put forward a very important idea: the dead do not bury themselves;
t.~eyare treated and disposed of by the living (PARKERPEARSON1999a; 1999b; Lucy 1992; 2002). It is
the community that decides the dressing of the deceased, the objects that should accompany them in
their grave and how they are placed; they are the ones that participate in the feasts, fasts or food offer-
ings that are triggered by a death and which lead to the placing of food and drink in a grave (PARKER
PEARSON1999b, 7-11). In the end, it is to them that all the messages put forward in the funerary rituals
are addressed to; they must be the ones to receive and understand them, not the dead!
Therefore one needs to understand mortuary rituals as the natural response of the community
to the loss of one of' its
' ' . members;
, '
they are not a .. .. ...
THEDECEASED
...
reflect Ion 0f an IIIdIVIdua 1s l1e

'
fi b ut 0f th e Impact
of their death16(HAKENBECK2004a,41), organ- hada certainway of life
ised by and aimed towards the living. As a result,
what we get in burials is not a reflection of the
THECOMMUNITY
deceased's life but an image that is constructed
by the community with the occasion of his/her hadits ideaof the deceasedand his/her life
death. What is more, it does not even need to be
a reflection of how that individual was perceived
by the community; it is just the end result of what FUNERARYRITUAL
the communi ty considered to be the proper way ' I ' '~ ' '
cont ame d th e const ruct ed Ilie and Ident It yo f th e d ecease d
of sayinggoodbyeto its member in a particular , ,.,
circumstance (MCCARTHY 2004) (Fig. 5). FIg,S,Thethree Imagesof the deceased,
I think that the best way to understand burials is to see them as the result of a theatrical play. The
plot of the play is simple: the death of a member a group. The scene, which is of course carefully chosen
and constructed, is represented by the locations where the different ritual activities take place, including
the actual laying in the ground of the mortuary remains. The actors are the other members of the group
and/or the different social groups that exist within that community. The viewers are also the members of
the group plus other adjacent communities, because if we assume that funerals were public events then
we can imagine members from each of the burial communities taking part in the funerals of the other
community (HAKENBECK 2004a, 52). The message that is transmitted through the play is entirely in the
hands of the actors themselves: they may chose to portray the individual just as he/she was (or better
yet was perceived) in real life; they may however opt to portray him/her as just any other individual of
that group even though the deceased had been one of the wealthier members or was actually a foreigner
which came into the group some time before and retained much of their original identity; or they may
very well prefer to emphasise the military attributes despite the deceased having only limited or no com-
bat experience at all. Also, we have to assume that the message of the play usually has a specific target
audience and that it is not necessarily perceived in a similar manner by different viewers. For instance,
the placing of a sica (Le.curved knife, specificof the Dacian area) could be understood by some as
declaring martial prowess, while others could translate it as suggesting the belonging of the deceased to
a particular social group; both interpretations may very well be true.
A question that naturally arises in such a scenario is why would a community choose to twist
reality in such a way? Why would they present a rich man/woman as being ordinary or a child or
adolescent as a military hero? The answers are unfortunately as many as there are opinions within
~6, From an evolutionaryperspective,deathis part of the environmentto which the humananimalneededto adapt.
Consequently the mortuary ritual is viewed asthe human's adaptive response to death, with ritual language singled
out as its crucial form of response (DAVIES1997, 1).
the post-processualist school, and most of them might be true; it is all very much dependent on the
individual context.
For example, let us take the case when the settlement evidence suggests wealth being accumu-
lated by a restricted group of individuals, while the burials show the image of an egalitarian society.
From a Marxist point of view the situation would be perfectly clear: the social group which is accumu-
lating wealth and thus rising to power is not yet strong enough so as to feel safe to display fully their
status, as the rest of the community members might react against them; thereby they willingly distort
the funerary ideology and portray an idealised image in the mortuary rituals in which all the individu-
als are shown as being equal. Thus the funerary 'play' is manipulated so that it suits the goals of certain
groups of people who have it in their best interest for a particular message to be transmitted (PARKER
PEARSON1982;LULL2000).Thereare of course other possiblenarratives.Thefunerary rituals might be
fixed by a set of very strict religious beliefs, which may very well have been adopted before wealth started
being accumulated by some members. These beliefs could have stated that no grave goods, or just some
particular kinds, were allowed to be deposited with the deceased (thus allowing only limited variability)
and that burials could only be constructed in a particular manner. In this case the entire community
would participate in order to distort the message, but not with the intention of depicting an ideal soci-
ety but to portray the ideas that the group shared about the afterlife. One more possibility is that there
was no manipulation of the funerary ritual at all; the burials showed the image of an egalitarian society
because those people may have well been like that. The wealthy members of society may have chosen
to differentiate themselves in such a clear manner in death that they built their final resting place in a
different area that may be quite far away from the community from which they came, making it difficult
for archaeologists to make a link between the two.
What I have hoped to demonstrate through this example, and the discussion that lead to it, is
that one should never consider burials as just a reflection of who the deceased was and of the society of
which he/she was part of. Burials are always the result of the decisions made by the people who organ-
ise the funerary rituals (Le. the mourners) and thus represent deliberate constructions which may be
anchored in reality to a greater or lesser degree. While I have not referred to identity directly, because it
constitutes in all cases one of the messages that is transmitted in the 'enactment' of the funerary ritual, it
is only natural that it follows the same rules. Consequently it seems reasonable for the same theoretical
assumptions to be used in my enquiry into Dacian identity. Unfortunately the model might not entirely
fit in this particular case and I intend to show why.
11.2. Going beyond burials

The funerary finds from Romania dated in the LT C2-D may appear at first glance to cover a
range of recognised burial practices: cremationsl7, in flat or tumulus graves, isolated or in small groupsl8,
most of them containing cremated remains19which were either deposited directly in a pit or put in a
funerary urn; the funerary inventory varies from just a pot (or even absolutely nothing), to full warrior
panoply and luxury items. So what is it that makes them so different that they shouldn't be analysed like
regular burials? It is very simple actually: their number.
The total number of burials from Romania belonging to the 'classic Dacian civilisation' is just
5120,for a period covering 250 years! It is not possible to argue that the region was not populated, as all
the settlement evidence points otherwise. Furthermore, the inhabitants of those lands must have been
quite numerous since ancient sources inform us that king Burebista could raise an army of 200,000 men
(VULPE-ZAHARIADE 1987),which eventhough undoubtedlyan exaggeration,bears witnessto the sheer
17. Only three individuals were inhumed.
18. Only the five graves from Zimnicea came from a large cemetery (containing 166 burials) but all except for these were dated
between the 4thand 3rdcentury BC (SiRBU1993,76). Additionally one may consider the finds from Hunedoara-Grddina
Castelului as a cemetery, but the large majority of the tombs belonged to very small children (SiRBUET AL. 2007).
19. Although seven of them were cenotaphs as no human bones were found.
20. There might be several other burials coming from the south-eastern part of Transilvania (COSTEA2002), but those find-
ings were generally uncovered more than fifty years ago and their actual existence cannot be validated. Anyhow, these
unconfirmed discoveries would only slightly raise the number of funerary findings and thus not make any real difference.
It should also be mentioned that there are about 70 known tumuli which probably date to the 'classic Dacian period' but
only around 30 of them have been investigated (SiRBU1994, 130).
-- ---
number of the people living there. Consequently we come to the same conclusion as all the authors
dealing with the Dacians that these people dealt with their dead in a manner that unfortunately left no
archaeological traces.
For this reason the 51 burials that have been identified need to be treated as special discoveries.
They do not represent the standard, regular way of dealing with the dead. They are exceptions, anoma-
lies! Hence, seeing them just as burials would be totally wrong as the messages that they portrayed and
the meanings behind them are linked to their special character. These burials do not respect the regular
funerary rules that were employed in the Dacian world and thus may very well not respect the general
rules about burials at all, making it highly problematic to use the model employed by archaeologist to
interpret mortuary practices in generaPI Therefore the placing of a sword in a grave may have nothing
to do with the deceased possessing outstanding military skills but may represent something totally dif-
ferent which could only be properly understood in a particular context and abiding by a particular set
of rules.
Despite this situation, I doubt that these extraordinary finds do not respect at least some of the
things that we generally think about burials. Hence, I am not implying that we should lead ourselves
into believing that it is impossible to get to the meaning of these 'alien'22graves. In the end, it is quite
likely that a sword in a burial may imply martial prowess as we would suspect, even though the mean-
ings associated with the object may be more numerous and complex than expected. I am just pointing
out the need to ground all the assertions that are made about them in a much more solid manner than
we would do when examining other types of burials. Moreover, it should be expected for meanings that
are not normally associated with the mortuary rituals to be present.
Therefore, my opinion is that even though they represent anomalies, we are still dealing with
manifestations of the funerary ritual; the deceased were really laid to rest in these graves and this cannot
be denied. Nonetheless, if the Dacian communities had only wanted to do that, to organise a mortuary
ritual for one of their members, they would have done it in the regular way, leaving no archaeological
traces. So the big question is why did they do it? Why do these 'alien' burials exist at all?23
I think that the communities opted to alter the funerary rituals in such a radical manner because
it was necessary for a very important message to be put forward. This would have been the perfect occa-
sion to achieve such a goal, since as already mentioned, we may assume that funerals were public events
involving members from the neighbouring communities, and because the impact that was achieved
through the deliberate modification of the mortuary ritual would have been considerable. Every partici-
pant to the ceremony would have been struck immediately by the marked difference in the treating of
these dead and thus we can assume that the intended meaning would have been extremely obvious. The
only question left to answer now is what was the transmitted message about? What was that important?
To find the answer it is necessary to look at the other processes and events that affected the Dacian popu-
lation in the LT C2-D and thus fit this very interesting phenomenon into its context.
11.3. The larger Dacian'picture'

The Dacians were not isolated. They came in contact with different populations and groups of
people that inhabited the regions around them. I think it is only fair to mention those that could have
influenced them in such a way so as to lead to the abnormal burial phenomenon (Fig. 6).
21. CRAWFORD (2004) actually argued that it might be better to see burials in general in the same manner as votive deposits,
as the main difference between a 'votive' deposit and a 'mortuary' deposit is the presence of all or part of a body, and even
this distinction does not always hold.
22. I employ the term 'alien' so as to signal the special character of the burials. It does not mean that they were foreign, coming
from outside the Dacian culture.
23. I think that this represents the question that we should be asking ourselves when looking at the Dacian burials. The
Romanian authors have been trying to understand why the people in the Late La Tene switched to an 'invisible' fu-
nerary ritual and at the same time decipher the social meaning behind the few graves that we had (MOSCALU1977;
SiRBU1985; 1986; BABE~1988; SiRBU1993; 1994; RusTolU ET AL. 2001). In contrast, I consider that we should begin
with the question of why we have these burials in the first place, as we normally should not. Only after the answer to
this riddle is unraveled can we really get behind the meanings that Romanian archaeologists have been so desperate
to get to.
First of all there are the Greeks who started occupying the shores of the Black Sea as far back as
the 7thcentury BC Their contact with the Dacians was very intense, as it can be proven by the numerous
Greek imports that can be found in many of the Late La Tene settlements from Romania (GLODARIU
1976), especially those to the south and east of the Carpathian arch, like Pope~ti (VULPE1955; 1959;
2004), Poiana (VULPE2003), Raditau (CAPITANU1976; 1981; 1986) and Brad (URSACHI1995).
Moreover, there seems to have been a
great influence relating to the structur-
ing of the Dacian political organisation,
especially in the case of Burebista who
may have even originated from a region
with strong contacts with the Greek col-
onies (STROBERL 1998, 85). Finally, the
d
architecture that can be seen in many of
the Dacian settlements, especially the
. defensive systems, seems to bear a strong
Hellenist resemblance (GLODARIU 1983).
The influence of the Roman Empire was
also considerable and the imports found
in the Dacian world (GLODARIU1976)
can again confirm that, as well as the
Fig. 6. The neighbours of the Dacians
(map produced using Google Earth).
massive penetration of Roman coins
(SPANU2006, 188-189). But it is the
Empires military force and campaigns which probably had the most important affect on the Dacians.
Starting from the second part of the 151 century BC the Romansestablishedthemselvesto the south of
the Danube; from this point onward the threat become imminent and military clashes between the two
forces were more and more frequent (VULPE-ZAHARIADE 1987).
Next we should consider the Celts, who in my opinion exerted a very powerful influence on the
Dacians. The first Celtic groups moved slowly during the second part of the 41hcentury BC travelling
through the northern part of the Great Hungarian Plain and entering the upper basin of the Tisza River;
afterwards they went south along the Western (or Apuseni) Carpathians and reached Transilvania24
where they cohabited with, and arguably dominated, the indigenous population, a process which is doc-
umented by a series of cemeteries which can be seen along this route (RusTOIu 2008, 69-70). During
the 2ndcentury BC one can observe the sudden disappearance of the Celtic graves and settlements from
Transilvania, a phenomenon that has been explained as either the assimilation of these people by the
local population or as them being "expelled" by migrating groups from the south of the Carpathians
which were led by a warrior elite, the so-called Padea-Panaghiurski-Kolonii group (WOZNIAK1974;
1975; 1976; RusToIU 2002; 2008). The Celts are thought to have introduced many new elements to the
Dacian world, a process which can also be seen in the burial evidence through the appearance of the
long La Tene double-edged swords (longswords) or chain mails. This influence was even more impor-
tant in Oltenia where there was close interaction with the Small Scordisci, a Celtic group that settled
around the Danube Gorge, resulting in an interesting cultural mix that manifested itself, among other,
in a specific form of burial practices.
Besides the Greeks, Romans, and Celts there were also other populations which regularly inter-
acted with the Dacians. To the south of the Danube, there were Thracian tribes, such as the Moesi or
Tribali who regularly formed alliances with their Late Iron Age counterparts from the north of the great
river (RusTOIu 2002). To the north-north-east there was a powerful Germanic (Przeworsk culture)
influence which lead to the formation of the already mentioned Lipita group that maintained a unique
burial ritual (BABE~1988, 9; SiRBU1993, 26-27), whereas in the upper basin of the Tisza River the Celtic
groups maintained their influence (KOTIGOROSKO 1995) leading to large settlements and cemeteries as
the ones from Zemplin (SiRBU1993,27). Finally, the Sarmatians, occupying the regions to the north of
24. I prefer to use the Romanian spelling, Transilvania, and not the English one, Transylvania, in order to respect its correct
Latin etymology.
II --
the Black Sea, had an important impact on the Dacian culture from Moldova and Muntenia (BARcA
2002) with whom they interacted regularly through exchange or any other type of contact.
After mentioning the external influences corning into the Dacian world it is necessary to look at
what was actually happening within the Late La Tene societies on the Romanian territory. It is crucial
that we understand the fundamental changes that took place in the region sometime in the second part
of the 2ndand start of the 151century BC, as one facet is the 'disappearance' of the burial evidence which
represented the background for the 'alien' mortuary practices.
With the start of the 'classic Dacian civilisation' we observe a massive demographic increase.
Archaeological finds point towards a large increase in the number of both rural, undefended settlements,
and more developed fortresses (FLoREA-SIRBu1997, 15) which reach, in some instances, a pre-urban
level, especially in the case of Sarmizegetusa, the capital of the Dacian state during the time of Decebalus
(GLODARIUET AL. 1988). Furthermore, most of the so called davae25,such as the ones from Pope~ti,
Poiana or Brad, even though existing from previous times, reach their maximum expansion and develop-
ment in this period, witnessing an important increase in crafts production (pottery, iron, bronze).26Some
authors would add that with the start of this period we can witness a shift of power from the regions out-
side the Carpathian arch to Transilvania, especially the region of the Ora~tie Mountains where a complex
web of fortified centres start being built (Coste~ti- Blidaru, Capfllna, Piatra Ro~ie,Banita, etc.) as well as
the future capital of Sarmizegetusa27(FLoREA-SIRBu1997, 15; RUSTOIU2002) (Fig. 7). This small area
would become the centre of what can be named to a certain extent the Dacian state.
The LT C2-D is thus the period when
the Dacian state takes shape and the two pil-
lars of this political creation, tightly linked
to one another, were the army and religion.
The so-called 'unification' of the Dacians was
done probably to a large extent through the
power ofthe army (FLoREA-SIRBu1997, 16).
Therefore, Burebista, the first who managed
to achieve this, used the power of his armies
to maintain control, which would explain why
from his time28 we have the first fortresses
that had a purely military function (VULPE-
ZAHARIADE1987,55). It seems however that
the new king went beyond just military force
as he needed a way to suppress efficiently the Fig.7.Thelocationofthe Ora~tieMountainsand Sarmizegetusa.
power of the local elite, some of whom no doubt controlled powerful tribal entities; hence he employed
the power of religion.
In the 61hcentury AD, Jordanes, a Romanised Goth from Moesia who wanted to write the his-
tory of his people and who, to our advantage, confused the Goths with the Getae wrote some extremely
interesting passages:
25. Many of the Dacian settlement names that we know from ancient sources contain the termination dava (e.g. Zargidava,
Capidava, Piroboridava) and hence the term is considered to be the equivalent of the Greek word polis. Therefore the
davae were large fortified settlements, with intense signs of habitation, including what may be in some places a 'residen-
tial area' and a sanctuary. They usually concentrated manufacturing and commercial activities and probably were tribal
centres controlling a territory around them with its rural settlements (BABE~1979; VULPE-ZAHARIADE 1987,43). All set-
tlements of this type disappear after the Roman conquest (BABE~2000, 329).
26. Conversely, STROBEL(1998, 81) thinks that such an affirmation is only true for Transilvania, while the maximum level of
development was already reached by this point in the regions to the south and east of the Carpathian arch. The archaeo-
logical finds however do not support this point of view.
27. STROBEL(1998) disagrees with this opinion as well and considers that the prominence of Transilvania over the regions
to the south of the Carpathian arch occurs only after the fall of Burebista's kingdom and the intervention of M. Licinius
Crassus in 29-28/27 BC, which created a large security zone, emptied of population, on the left banks of the Danube.
28. Although the dating of the first phase from these fortresses is often just conventionally thought as being during the reign
of Burebista (LOCKYEAR 2004).
"Then when Burebistas was king of the Goths, Decaeneus came to Gothia at the time when Sulla
ruled the Romans."
"Burebistas received Decaeneus and gave him almost royal power."
"Their [the Dacians'] safety, their advantage, their one hope lay in this, that whatever their counsel-
lor Decaeneus advised should by all means be done; and they judged it expedient that they should put it
into effect."
"Thus by teaching them ethics he [Decaeneus] restrained their barbarous customs; by instructing
them in the science of nature, he made them live naturally under laws of their own.. .He taught them logic
and made them skilled in reasoning beyond all other races; he showed them practical knowledge and so
persuaded them to abound in good works,"
"He [Decaeneus] chose from among them those that were at that time of noblest birth and superior
wisdom and taught them theology, bidding them worship certain divinities and holy places. He conferred
the name of Pilleati on the priests he ordained, I suppose because they offered sacrifice having their heads
covered with tiaras, which we otherwise call pillei."
"But he bade them call the rest of their race Capillati."
(http://www.harbornet.com/folks/theedrich/Goths/Gothsl.htm)
In my opinion Jordanes gives the answer to how Burebista kept under control the Dacian tribal
leaders: by employing Decaeneus at his side who introduced a major social and religious reform. There
has been an enormous amount of debate around the problem of who this Decaeneus character really
was29and the precise nature of the changes that he brought to the Dacians (CRI~AN 1977; BODoR 1981;
DAICOVICIU1981; GOSTAR-LICA 1984; AVRAM1989; FLOREA-SiRBU 1997; PETRE 2004; FLoREA 2006)
and it would not be appropriate to go further into this discussion30as it would require a large amount
of space. Nevertheless we need to remember that major changes occurred in fundamental areas of the
Dacian societies and we can only guess some of its effects in the archaeological record, one of them
being the 'disappearance' of the burials. There seems to be however an important chronological issue,
since most of the changes appear to have started sometime in the second half of the 2ndcentury BC,
while Decaeneus'sreforms only occurred after the start of the 1st century Be. A good solution to this
problem has not yet been proposed, as far as I know of.
Now that both the 'external' and 'internal' situation has been briefly presented the existence of
the 'alien' mortuary practices seems to make somewhat more sense. They were without a doubt triggered
by the tremendous turmoil which affected the Dacian world, both due to this process of'state centralisa-
tion' and the increasing Roman pressure. However, for the picture to be even clearer, I will summarise
the other major phenomena taking place in the Late La Tene linked to the same category as the burials
(Le. ritual activities).
First of all there is the appearance of the impressive temple structures starting with the begin-
ning of the 1stcentury BC (Fig. 8.1, 8.2). Made both of wood and stone, these religious structures, which
probably evolved from local domestic forms, were generally located within the ramparts of settlements
or fortresses31which were also the places where it is likely that the elites resided (FLoREA-PuPEzA
2008,292). All of the temple buildings, including those from outside Roman Dacia, disappear after the
Roman conquest (BABE~2000, 331), a phenomenon that has been interpreted as the immediate fall of
the religious beliefs associated with these structures after the 'be-heading' of the Dacian aristocracy
(FLoREA-PuPEzA2008).
Next, starting with the 2ndcentury BC, but apparent especially in the 1stcentury BC and 1stcen-
tury AD, the Dacians practised human sacrifices. This phenomenon which is recorded both by ancient
29. Especially since his life-history and activity is remarkably similar to what the antique source tell us about Zalmoxis, one of
the most important Dacian gods (PETRE2004),
30. I feel the need however to express my support to the view proposed by AVRAM(1989) and further developed by PETRE
(2004) according to which the aristocracy suffered a change of character, shifting from a military to an aulic elite, hence
changing their 'sign' from the lavishly ornamented helmets that we can find in the 4thand 3,dcentury BC burials to a new
kind of 'helmets', the pillei mentioned by Jordanes.
31. It has been pointed out that many of the strategic fortresses that had a purely martial function, with no apparent impor-
tant civilian inhabitance, had sanctuaries located in their immediate vicinity (e.g. at Blidaru-Pietroasa /ui Solomon, Batca
Doamnei, Piatra Ro~ie, Piatra Craivii), further pointing out to a link between the military and religion (FLOREA-SiRBU
1997, 16).
.. ,.__1
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Fig. 8.1. 'Sacred area' ofSarmizegetusa (GHEORGHIU2005,349).

1. string; 2. wall; 3. paved road; 4. channel; 5. stairs; 6. temple with plinths; 7. dismantled plinths; 8. stone pilasters;
9. hearth; 10. wooden pilasters; 11. threshold; 12. curb; 13. arrow of andesite sun; 14. andesite sun; 15. entrance platform;
16. terraces.
.e........
0.0...
.. "0.
/ ""...
I.. : ~.. ~
I. ~.. :_
... f ...
'\, \.....,. ..:..
.. .~.-~&~ .
,. 0.............
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Fig.8.2. Great circular temple and rectangular temple from Sarmizegetusa (GHEORGHIU
2005, 345, 347).
writings (e.g. Herodotus, Jordanes, Stephanus of Byzantium, Eustathius, Pomponius Mela) and archaeo-
logical discoveries, was apparently practised for several reasons and on different occasions: propitiation
of the divinities, founding of a building, death of the husband (which can sometimes lead to the sacrifice
of both the wife and children), death of a community member, killing of prisoners, etc. (SiRBU1993,
31-36). Most of the sacrificial victims were children though adolescents and adults were present too,
but no bones came from the elderly. The remains often presented signs of violence and were frequently
.
found in pits, both inside and outside settlement areas, and contained large quantities of ceramics and
animal bones, but never weapons. The skeletons were sometimes found complete and other times less
so and the bones were often in non-anatomical connection (SiRBU1985).
Finally, there's the hoarding of precious metal objects. Approximately 29 golden and more than
800 silver objects were found in 350 Dacian hoards (Fig. 9), dated in the 1"1century BC and 1"1century
AD. Most of them were random discoveries and it has
been suggested that we may be dealing with their delib-
erate exclusion from settlements and their hoarding in
remote places (SPANU2006,190-192). SPANU(2002) has
identified two phases of this phenomenon, one dated
I betweenthe middle and end of the 1sl century BCwhen
it occurred only inside the Carpathian arch, and a second
one when it was extended towards the west and south, in
Banat, Oltenia and Muntenia.32He also points out that
in Transilvania the hoarded goods contained both 'inter-
national' prestige objects33as well as local ones, whereas
to the south the few hoards that were present contained
only 'international' prestige goods, with the goods com-
ing from within the Carpathian arch being placed in
graves.34It appears therefore that the phenomenon exhib-
Fig. 9. Silver objects from Sarcsau hoard
ited important regional characteristics a~d is undoubtedly
(GHEORGHIU2005, 479).
linked to different layers of identity being expressed.
11.4.Fitting the 'alien'burials into the picture
The Dacian burials were hence one of the outcomes of an extremely agitated period. The Celtic
pressure disappears only to be replaced by the Roman menace; the mortuary practices of the 41hand yd
century BC, usually incineration in tumulus graves (SiRBU2006b), were replaced by a new and 'invisible'
ritual; the local tribes fight to dominate their neighbours leading to a fragile state which was split due
to local rivalries, only to emerge again almost a hundred years later; a religious reformer acquired king-
like power; fortresses and temples (to old or new gods) were built, and the list could go one. But it is in
volatile situations of this type that identity seems to be expressed in the strongest manner; questions of
identity often come to the fore at times of social and political change; the destruction of existing socio-
cultural patterns and shifting power relations lead to the re-evaluation and re-presentation of identities
as new communities arise (GRAvEs-BRawN-JoNES1996, 1).
I believe that many of the 'alien' burials had as one of their fundamental motivation just this, the
desire to express a different identity; these graves became fixed points of reference in a very dynamic
world. They represent a phenomenon directly triggered by the socio-political situation; they are the out-
come of increased interaction which led the communities to become more conscious of the differences
between them and the people who they came in contact with.35The religious reform and the integration
in a large political structure would surely have added to this. From this point of view the burials may also
be seen as a means of resistance and of protest to these overarching structures that would have empha-
sised the similarities, all the things that the Dacian communities shared with one-another, in order to
maintain cohesion and thus control.
In conclusion, the Dacian burials, far from being simple biographies of the deceased, are the
result of the dynamism of the period. They hold within them important information about the identity
of the Late La Tene communities who felt the need to express these ideas in such times. The funerary
32. He dates the maximum height of production and hoarding of objects between the first Roman campaigns in the inferior
basin of the Danube (74, 72-71 BC) and the firm installation of the Roman legions in the inferior part of the Danube
(middle of 1st centuryAD) (SPANU
2006,191).
33. Which he defines as objects that circulated across a larger area.
34. The conclusion is valid only for the areas where the funerary phenomenon still left archaeological traces, like the one in
Oltenia (with the Scordisc influence).
35. A similar observation is made by WELLS(2007) when he looks at the identity in Central Europe during the Early Iron
Age.
-
rituals represent the means through which these groups chose to put forward a simple message: "This
is who we are!"
III. The Identity behind the Dacian burials

In this part I will take a closer look at the burial evidence. In the first half I will be making broad
observations about the graves, relating to the different types that are encountered, their spatial distribu-
tion, the chronology and the gravegoods that we can find within them, thus extracting general informa-
tion about the identity of the deceased and the communities that housed them. The second half will be
formed of two case studies, where I will aim to give a detailed reconstruction of the identity of those
particular communities based on the funerary discoveries.
IlL 1. General considerations

The total number of Dacian burials that have been dated to the LT C2- D amounts to just 5p6,
but the number of individuals that they contained is just 44 since 7 of them were cenotaphs and in
each case there were only the remains of one person within each grave.37The large majority of the indi-
viduals were incinerated (41), which represents
the main reason why some archaeologists con-
sider that cremation was the regular burial rite
of the Dacian aristocracy (BABE~1988; SiRBU
1994). The graves come from only 22 locations
because an important number of them were part
of small necropolises, comprising of anything
between 2 and 12 graves, though in the case of
Zimnciea and Hunedoara-Gradina Castelului
their number gets as high as several hundred.38
As for the type of burials that are encountered,
27 were tumulus while the remaining 24 were
flat. It should be remarked that almost in no case
havesigns of robbery
. ..been mentioned.
. . . 10.The location
FIg. . of the DaClanbunals
.. and the zones they
The spatial dIstnbutIOn of the DaCIan define.1.Hunedoara-Griidina Castelului;2.Calan; 3. Coste~ti-
funerary discoveries is in my opinion quite Cetiifuie;4. Cugir; 5. Tartiiria;6. Blandiana;7. Teleac;8.Tili~ca;
revealing as it is relatively clear that they clus- 9. Poiana (Gorj); 10. Grop~ani; 11. Spnlncenata; 12. Cepari;
ter in .three' regions . (Fig.. 10): one in south-west
. 13. Cetiite~i; 14. Orbeasca de Sus; 1.5.Liice~i; I? Zimnicea;
17. Pope~tl; 18. Radovanu; 19. PISCU Crasam; 20. Brad;
Transl 1vama, espeCla 11y III th e Mure~ RIver va 1- 21. Riiciitiiu; 22. Poiana (Galati).
ley; another one in Muntenia and the eastern .
part of Oltenia; and the third in Moldova, in the Siret River valley. This raises the suspicion of a different
regional identity being expressed in each of the three cases. On a closer examination of the burials this
idea seems to be confirmed to an extent.
A total of 16 Dacian graves were found in Transilvania, 11 of which were flat, coming from 8
locations. A remarkable characteristic of this group is that half of the burials contained weapons39and
among them there was always a sica or its scabbard and in 7 cases lances were also present (Fig. 11).
This is extremely important because only two other graves of the total of 51 had a sica while 11
contained a lance. Therefore it appears that one of the principal elements that was illustrated through
36. There are of course a considerablenumber of burials which have been identifiedbut not excavated;nonetheless,those
would at best double the current figure.
37. Even though in the first tumulus at Brad (Brad Tl) there might be two cremated individualsburied underneath the
mound. Furthermore, in the case of the third tumulus from Brad (Brad T3), besides the main incineration burial, there
were also the remains from two inhumations, but these represented without a doubt human sacrifices (SiRBU1994; UR-
SACHI1995). A similar situation seemed to have occurred at one of the tombs from Cetiiteni (Cetiiteni M2) where the
dismembered skeletons of three children were identified underneath a stone pavement (MANDESCU 2006).
38. In the case of Zimniecea however only 5 burials out of 166 were dated in the 2ndcentury BC, while the rest belonged to
the 4thand 3rdcenturies BC (SiRBU1994,76). As for Hunedoara-Griidina Castelului only 6 of the graves were taken in my
analysis because all the rest come from children of very small ages (SiRBUET AL. 2007).
39. In most cases the tombs contain almost exclusively weapons plus, in some cases, horse-gear.
10 the Transilvanian funerary ritual was mar-

tial prowess; that these communities held
5'. 11111 . an important military power during the
0'"
lmllP-IIIII,-IIIIIL
I- LIIIII~~mnP--lIIlI_ I" century BC,when most of the finds can
,,~ .,-~
~ if
~ "
rq'?
~
~fl; e
... ~.
r:;.fl.. ~
.~ 'S'
~ be more or less dated.40 The object cho-
~o
~e'1i ~(-~ ~~~ ..<l''' <-e~~o 'l.J> ~'O0 ,~</o <.,0 sen to put forward this message was par
<:J' i~ 'be; .~
/~'1i ;/0 '{-<:' excellence the sica (Fig. 12), an item that is
.,;.g-.i'"~'lJ-0o found almost exclusively in funerary con-
~o<' <,,~e<:' texts and has its maximum concentration
'{-~,o in Oltenia41,
. in. the regionswith an impor-
Fig. 11. Categories of objects found in the burials from Transilvania. A
tant Scor d ISC IIIfluence (SPANU 2002 , 99) .

It is difficult to infer about the popular-
ity of the sica in the Dacian world, even
though we have depictions of it on Trajan's
column and the possibly on the metopes
of the Trophy of Adamclisi (Fig. 13).42The
1 importance of the martial aspect in south-
west Transilvania could have many expla-
nations: local conflicts; the rise of powerful
elites that started expanding their terri-
tory - as let us not forget this is the cen-
tre around which the Dacian states were
formed and, as already mentioned, they
did not preferentially employ diplomacy;
Fig. 12. Sicae found in burials. 1. from Blandiana (GHEORGHIU
a military tradition brought about by the
2005,509); 2. from Radovanu (VULPE1976). confrontation with Celtic populations, etc.
Moving on to the weaponless tombs
from Transilvania, these came from three
locations and none of them were isolated
discoveries. All of them, except for grave
16a from Hunedoara-Grddina Castelului
which had no funerary inventory at all,
contained adornments (e.g.bracelets, rings,
pendants, beads) made out of iron, bronze,
silver and glass. Fibulae, pottery and animal
bones were recovered in half of the cases.
The first tumuli from Cugir (Cugir Tl) and
the five burials from Hunedoara-Grddina
Castelului (13a, 16a, 17, 18 and 27) (SiRBU
ET AL. 2007) can be characterized as being
poor, with very few objects. It'shard to iden-
tify the aspects of identity that were evoked
:;~~~-,
in them, but because they were part of
Fig. 13. Sicae from Trajan's column (after COARELLI2000).
necropolises that had burials with weapons,
40. Of course, in some cases the chronology can be extended to the end of the 2nd century BC and in other to the start of
the 1" century AD. Only the tumulus from Coste~ti-Cetiituie has been dated as belonging only to the 1" century AD
(GHEORGHIU 2005, 208).
41. Consequently, the presence of the sica in the burials might be considered as a desire to illustrate a connection between
the people of Oltenia and those in south-west Transilvania. This relation appears to have been integrated into the identity
of the communities. Such an idea would fit with RusTOIu's (2002; 2008) assumptions of a movement of people from the
south, across the Carpathians, to the Mure~ River valley around the middle of the 2ndcentury BC, led by the Padea-
Panaghiurski-Kolonii warriors.
42. Although the curved weapons in the depictions can also be interpreted as being a falx, a specific kind of sword used by
the Dacians.
I --
we can only guess that they referred to a complementary identity, adding a more localized dimension.
On the other hand, the two tombs situated near the important Dacian settlement ofTili~ca (Lupu 1989)
contained several silver and glass objects, which may suggest ideas about the wealth of the community,
somewhat contrasting with the stress on military attributes seen in the other cases.43Consequently, it is
my opinion that the burials from south-west Transilvania imply a strong regional identity that had as its
principal element military power, with more local nuances introduced by the weaponless tombs. Only the
people of Tili~ca,who were situated further to the east and at some distance from the Mure~ River, appear
to have constructed a unique, local identity, which was expressed through the display of adornments.
In Muntenia and eastern Oltenia 22 Dacian burials have been excavated, the majority being
located near important Dacian settlements; 10 of them were tumulus, 3 of which were cenotaphs, and
12 flat. This is a large area compared to the other two, and displays an enormous diversity in terms of
the gravegoods and their association (Fig. 14). This may be seen as being the result of very different
influences that were being felt in the
region (Le.Greek, Roman, Scordisc) 14 ,~~~_=_~_-
_ ___ _____
which led to unique identities taking 12,.,
shape and being expressed. For this 1~r
reason it is very difficult to observe 6 l .
any general patterns for this region.

One of the things that does stand np
4 r'
tll
: L=-;JOOtJI1111~-
1
jllLmJ(
to a certain degree is that 6 of the ...<;\ ';:."w<;\ <;\ .e-" .~ e-" <;\ 'f;:-"
'" ~" ~'Ii ~ c.,({; ~" <.e- >:' .o~ 0"
total of 8 cham maIls found m the ~""({; ~~ K""~ >.it; e""o <>.0'" ~~o '''-~ ()
,0 (J' 0 ',0 c.,c .~.~
Dacian. burials comeC from
. Muntenia.
. . ~~ ~(:-" <l .~<io'/; ~<$' c.,~"
Wh at IS even more lascmatmg IS t h at ().~
&<:'
~,~
~e <::I o'~"
00
~,o
\f:'
.~ 0" e'li ~ r:-"
among these only the first grave from ~o
f;:-"~
~
0' <::I
o~
,,~"O
e
~" ",<::10
~.
Cetateni
"
(Cetateni M1) and the sec- .,e'li
~~'
w" ~
~O
~<:'~
ond and forth tumuli from Pope~ti ~({; '?'

(Pope~ti T2 and T4) were relatively Fig.14.Categoriesofobjectsfoundin the burialsfromMuntenia
lavish, with a considerable number of and easternOltenia.
objects, some of the made of gold and silver. The rest of the tombs contained only a small number of other
objects, like in the case of Poiana (Gorj) where there was only one other piece of bronze which may have
come from a helmet. This is undoubtedly a sign that the chain mail, a rare and difficult to manufacture
object, was seen as having an important meaning to these communities; that meaning may not neces-
sarily link to military prowess. The chain mails may be regarded as a sign of the prestige of the deceased
and the community due to their extreme scarcity and the investment gone into their acquisition, which
may infer that the group identity was constructed around the idea of them seeing themselves as differ-
ent from the rest, maybe even superior.The same idea of uniqueness is suggestedthrough the five2nd
century tombs of Zimnicea, part of a larger cemetery containing 41hand 3rdcentury graves. It appears
in this case that there's a desire to illustrate a strong link to the past, hence stressing the importance of
history, which is one of the pillars in the creation and maintenance of identity (Lucy 2006, 98). The two
tumuli near the settlement of Piscu Crasani depict again a unique case: both of them were cenotaphs,
one of them without any inventory whatsoever and the other containing just three items (a pendant, a
fibula, and a fragment from a bronze object that may have come from a helmet) (SiRBU1994,125-126).
I believe that the main idea behind the two tombs was the act of building the monuments themselves,
as they might not be made to commemorate the death of any actual person; their erection created the
occasion to express the local identity and for the community binds to be strengthened. The tumulus near
the dava of Radovanu on the other hand, appears to be very similar to those found in Transilvania, as
it contained a sica, 2 lance-tips and horse-gear, with an additional 'southern' touch, through the pres-
ence of a chain mail. We may be dealing here with an identity which is defined through the connec-
tions maintained with the Transilvanian centres and/or with those from the regions of Oltenia with a
powerful Scordisc influence. However, since it is an isolated grave, there is the possibility that what was
actually expressed was the 'otherness' of the deceased; that he was a warrior coming from distant lands.
Finally, the four tombs situated close to the important dava of Pope~ti, part of a group of ten tumuli,
43. Although it might be that the finds from Tili~ca actually do not come from burials but from two silver hoards.
present a different situation. The burials were

placed in a position of high visibility, on height-
ened terrain, making them clear symbols of the
Dacian settlement (VULPE1976, 205) (Fig. 15).
They imply sheer military might, with the sec-
ond and the forth tumuli (Popoe~ti T2 and T4)
containing swords, lances and chain mails; T4
additionally had a helmet, a sica, an umbo from a
oI I zee . . 4011.
. shield, arrowheads, horse-gear, practically all the
equipment that could have been used in battle.

Additionally, a great variety of clothing accesso-
ries and adornments were included: numerous
fibulae, pendants, glass beads, even a bronze mir-
ror. Moreover, numerous ceramic vessels were
........ added, such as cups or 'fruit bowls'44but also
Novae; Kos amphorae (imports or local imitations). The
('''''''''):
,.""""" utilisation of all these objects suggest an iden-
Fig. 15. Plan of the area of Pope~ti (after VULPE1955). tity based on the concepts of martial force and
wealth; the community defined itself, and wanted
to be seen, as an important centre of power, one
that was able to engage confidently in battle and
that controlled vast amounts of recourses.
The third and last area, to the east of the
Carpathians, is comprised of the 12 tumuli which
were part of the small cemeteries of three very
important davae, plus an isolated flat grave; they
were located on the banks of the Siret River. In
this case the military aspect is almost entirely
absent as there are no weapons present in the
graves, just fragments from a lorica sqamata and
some iron rings which may have come from a
Fig. 16. 'Fruit bowls: 1-2. from Craiva (GHEORGHIU2005, chain mail in one of the tumuli of Riiditau, plus
405); 3-4. from Spnlncenata (PREDA1986, 159). a few arrowheads at Brad. Imports, Roman and
especially Greek (Le. amphora, kantharoi, fibulae,
glass objects), were quite frequent, being present
cr
10
8 in almost half of the burials (Fig. 17); addition-
6~' ally there were a number of objects made of silver
41 and gold (silver rings, a golden leaf, a gilded lion's
mask, a thin golden sheet covering a round iron
~1,/ IIIII~- lllll~- -IIIII~ object). It appears to me as if these communities
~,e" defined themselves through their extensive com-
4>0
(,e
,/>0 mercial activities, an image that is also strongly
,,,,fIo
;$'~ suggested by the large number of imports found
<:P within the settlements. However, the tumuli from
.,'IT
~e
~ Brad, the settlement that was northernmost of the
~~
~0° three, had very few gravegoods45but the other 9
Fig. 17. Categories of objects found in the burials
tumuli of the necropolis, which were not exca-
from Moldova. vated, might have indicated a different situation.46
44. The so-called 'fruit bowls' are a type of vessel that has a large circulation in Romania during the Late La Tene (Fig. 16).
45. Even though two of the tumuli from Poiana and one from Riiciitiiupresented a similar situation.
46. Conversely, the flat grave from Brad, located near the settlement but not part of the tumulus cemetery, presents the same
category of imported objects that are found at Poiana and Riiciitau. However, because the gravegoods, type of grave and
location contrasts highly with the tumuli, it seems likely that in this case the 'otherness' of the deceased is expressed; he
Nevertheless Brad could have expressed a more local identity, especially since the third tomb (Brad T3)
contained, beside the deceased's cremated remains, two inhumed, sacrificial victims.
A thing that could prove enlightening for the analysis is to examine whether it is possi-
ble to observe any evolution that takes place in time from the 2ndcentury BC to the 151century AD.
15 16
20, ~I- -
~IMW/HI--~III ~ ~IHI-- iMlm~IIUJ-- - -lil,mrl~l. _ __
O< ~___J
2nd cenMy BC2nd -1st century 1stcenturyBC 1steentury BC_ 1st centuryAO
BC 1st century AD
. .
Fig. 18. Number of bun a1s per time interval.
Unfortunately, there is a very strong impediment relating to the very poor dating of the burials. As far
as I am aware, the chronology was established in most, if not all cases using object typologies. Therefore
the dating is at best highly relative making chronological categorisations extremely risky. At best 5 peri-
ods could be fixed (Fig. 18): 2ndcentury BC, 7 burials; 2ndto 151century BC, 15 burials; 151century BC,
16 burials; 1'1century BC to 1'1century AD, 4 burials; and 1'1century AD, 9 burials; obviously there is
a serious overlap between some of the five time intervals. If we try to observe the regions in which the
9_/T
! I---"-
'
8 -t.~~ /
--'~---,- I
1
I
!
~ Transilvania
7~"I--'
J
6+/\ I
j
sJ I/',\--
.- I
4' 1 / I' ..I
I [ll]]ll Muntenia and
II. -j eastern Oltenia
3-1' I -- ---- I
2-1-1'-'-- - -I
I / 1
I
1-( ! ---I
I
0'
--I
i
9 Moldova
1st c. BC - 1st
7
1st c.AD
c.AD
Fig. 19.Number of burials in each period/region.
tombs appear in each of those periods (Figure 19) it seems that the burials of Muntenia and Oltenia, as
well as those from Transilvania, even though the latter start off later, were built especially in the 2ndand
151century BC, while those of Moldova are constructed in the 151century BC (Poiana) and 151century
AD (Brad and Racatau). Consequently I might dare to say that there was an apparent move from the
west-south-west to the east (Illl/l). This apparent pattern might have to do with how strongly the pres-
sure coming from the Roman Empire was being felt; as the Romans advanced to the Danube and then
crossed it, the communities that felt threatened by their presence reacted (Ill 1/2). Of course it may
also have to do with the struggle for political domination within the Dacian territory; first there would
be the rise of the centre from Transilvania47,then an expansion to the south in Muntenia and Oltenia
and finally to the east (Illl/3). Thus, the communities could be seen as living organisms, immediately
might have been a merchant from one of the other two davae. If this was indeed the case, then the community of Brad was
clearly delimiting itself as different from the settlements to the south.
47. This would mean ignoring the finds from the 2ndcentury Be. Five of them come from only one site, Zimnicea and are close
to the Danube; in their case the reaction to the Roman presence seems much is more plausible. The other two 2ndcentury
tombs are from Cetiiteni.
reacting by clearly emphasising their identity as soon as the threat of being incorporated in a larger
structure appeared.
. fint crond
I" camyBC)
. J""IcmlUly8C
.
.......
appro& ,8 c:ealwyBC
Illustration 1. 1. The movement of the 'wave' of Dacia burials; 2. The reaction to the Roman pressure as suggested by
the burial evidence; 3. The reaction to the battles for political control suggested by the burial evidence. 1. Hunedoara-
GradinaCastelului;2. CaIan;3. Coste~ti-Cetatuie;4. Cugir; 5. Tartaria; 6. Blandiana;7.Teleac;8.Tili~ca;9. Poiana (Gorj);
10. Grop~ani; 11. Sprancenata; 12. Cepari; 13. Cetateni; 14. Orbeasca de Sus; 15. Laceni; 16. Zimnicea; 17. Pope~ti;
18.Radovanu; 19.Piscu Crasani; 20. Brad; 21. Racatau; 22. Poiana (Galati).
At this point I do not think that any more information can be gathered through a general analy-
sis. Nonetheless, the conclusions obtained so far, about the difference in the creation of identity in the
three geographical regions, as well as the possible scenarios observed through the examination of the
chronology, represent a good indicator of the dynamics occurring in the Dacian world during the Late
La Tene.
111.2. Case studies

I wish to continue by undertaking a close examination of two Dacian burials. I will aim to extract
as much information as possible about the identity of the deceased and that of the community from
which he/she was part of. In order to do so, I will start by presenting the general context of the tombs,
continue with the gravegoods and finish with the analysis.
The first burial that I will be looking at is the second tumulus found at Cugir (Cugir T2) (CRI~AN
1980) and is dated in the 151century Be. This finding represents the richest funerary discovery attributed
to the Dacians, along with the forth grave from Pope~ti (Pope~ti T4) (VULPE1976). The tomb was part
of a group of four tumuli and was located near an important fortified Dacian settlement. It was placed
on an 8 m wide artificial terrace that was dug into the steep south-west ridge of the hill which housed
the settlement. The mound, made out of large quantities of river boulders and local stone covered with
earth, had underneath it an area delimited by a small ditch which was covered with yellow clay, and
contained the funerary pyre, made of fir wood, and a small pit in the middle. The deceased, a 35 year
old male, was dressed in full panoply, with an Eastern Celtic helmet (PFLUG1989), chain mail, a long
LT D sword, a sica, a lance and a shield with iron margins and umbo. He was placed in a cart pulled
by two horses, the remains of which were found along with those from a third horse that would have
~c~ ~d for riding. After the incineration, the ashes

::.: tamed objects were placed together in the small
':~-:r.L pit which contained, besides the already men-
- :-e.:i artefacts, adornments (massive silver fibulae
'---~ s_".er buttons) and two gold plates, one that was
: ': decorated and had its extremity in the form
, : ; sr-:lised animal, probably a ram48,and the other
.;,,""' ,: fragment that would have been attached to an
-' -
Gb'ect Fig. 20). Next, the small pit was covered
.
-~ ~-ehow clay and on top of this was placed a small,

::,; : hand-made ceramic vessel, a large (0.70 m in
.:..u::eter . black 'fruit bowl', and a bronze situla, hav- .
-g 'rapezOl dal attachments

' and swan -shaped handles. ':~
.:- :~ of all of the above was fixed a large rock (60 x .~,
. -;,.:;~m which sealed the grave.

.
:t is quite clear that we are faced with the : 11I
-~~=~<; from a very elaborate ritual that was care-

':'';';':-.-
p:anned and in which the attention to detail was
:=:r.l"rdinary. Most
': ~ -.\-;ilibeliefs ofthese
about the elements undoubtedly
afterlife, such had
as the small ' I"!
.~ 1
'"' '.:'" de';miting the circular area and the use of yellow ] ~
:..:. Mm of which demarcated t~at area ofland, sug- :1 ~"~;'..
f\
<;;1"
,:~~ ~~",
~-e:~ among other, the separation of the dead from A 4
.
- - e ~-;~g. \ \'e have to realise ~hat this funeral would 3 ~) ...~ ~. ~~~,.
-.:. e :epresented an extremely Important event for the" f. 1.~5
.: =~t': and that it would have been witnessed by Fig.20.Cugir,objectsfoundin tumulusnr.2;
- .i.r'.-Gf the neighbouring groups; not only was the 1-4. iron,5. gold(SiRBU-ARSENESCU 2006,181).
-~~~ funerary rite modified, but the entire 'play' was done with careful planning. The identity markers
~ ha':e been evident in all the elements employed in the ritual, both to the local community and the
..c1'participants. The boundary between the locals and the 'other' was first of all drawn through the
,
-,:_~ .:.self,through practice, especially considering its unique character. The precision and the organi-
..:::-:. FC~ts to clear rules that the members of the local community would have been aware of; they
: ~~ ~':e known the meaning behind them. This kind of knowledge brought the community together;
- s a:: element that made its members aware of all the similarities they shared. As for the items that
e:-ep:aced, there is a clear combination of military aspects and wealth. The full panoply, containing
;;c'~-:""ng that a warrior could have needed, was almost like a threat made to the neighbouring com-
- ~.._~es The Eastern Celtic helmet implies large regional connections, while the cart seems to be more
-
_ ~.e.:i tG the past since it is a type regularly encountered in the Middle La Tene funerary rituals ($PANU
~.-:-.: ::-. Therefore, the identity is expressed through the communities' and the deceased's relation-
,- ,~ :~ both the present and the past. Moreover,the presence of the cart with two horses plus a riding
- :~e ~ be seen as a form of conspicuous consumption on a two-fold level: first they could have cho-
'..:..:~ p-.rteither one or the other since they had similar functions to a large extent49;secondly, they could
: e .:2:Dse~to put only the cart and the horse-gear50without actually sacrificing the horses. Hence the
~- -:-~et~ ~illise both may either suggest sheer wealth, or the strong connection existing between the
.:c-..:easedand horses, which would make these animals one of the pillars of his identity. 51 Finally, there is
. _-e. a "e~: clear message being expressed through the placing of the three intact objects, the small ves-
~
:~1.rge fruit bowl' and bronze situla, on top of the cremated remains. The situla appears to have been
~ ~
~ piece could have been part of the horse-gear (CRI~AN1980,83).
I ;:0::;.:.aagh the cart was just for parading while the horse was also used in battle, though the golden plate, part of the
- ,--=-c-~. points again towards parading.
=- -~~-gear is a 'normal' find in the graves containing weapons (e.g. Blandiana, Calan, Tartaria).
-..: : ~~t in this case it is the identity of the deceased and less that of the community being expressed because neither
,
-emains or horse-gear appear in the other two excavated tumuli (Cugir T1 and T4).
.
or-
'- :', hti~; ., an Italic import (SPANU2002,127) while the other two
~ objectswereof clearlocalorigin. So couldthis suggest
a contrast; the opposition between the rising power
to the south (Le. Romans) and the local community?
Moreover, there could be another contrast between the
j small vessel and the large 'fruit bowl'. Even though it
is very hard to confirm such a scenario, I would ven-
ture to say that the 'fruit bowl: which was placed in
· a central position and 'dominated' the other objects,
1 was used as a symbol of the local community, while the
, small ceramic vessel symbolised other Dacian groups,
~~~},:~~;~
~/~.:"" :: :"., . -
...
- .
and the situla referred to the newly arrived Romans.
Therefore the community expressed their superiority
over their adversaries, both local and from afar; they
defined themselves through the power that they had
accumulated.
Let us move now to a very different case, at
Sprancenata where we find an inhumation grave located
" inside a dava (Fig.21) and dated to the pt century AD
(PREDA1986). The burial is made of a rectangular
and irregular pit starting from a depth of 1.90 m and
extended in a semicircle to a depth of 3 m to the west. It
is only from this depth (3 m), where a threshold of yel-
Fig.21. General view of the dava from Sprancenata
(PREDA 1986, 131). low clay was laid out, that the grave pit actually started,
rectangular in shape and orientated north to south. The
pit contained some pottery sherds52,but much more
significantly, it had on the bottom a coffin, carved out
, .
" of half of a tree trunk, and being thinner towards the
southern part, where the feet of the deceased would have
been, and wider towards the northern part (Fig. 22).
The coffin did not contain any objects or bones; the
only skeletal remains coming from the pit were a radius
a~d .some~halangesbelongingto an ado!escent.Also
~
"'.", ," 'i' . ,,.~.,.., "',., m','. .
'.t ~.';h «,;~~~ .', ~~. ' . .':;,' sl.gnrficant IS that the lower part of the pIt, after st:p-
J.i/" I ,., "><Iv,/" prng down from the threshold, was made to look lrke
~,.;;'
q ~.P"" : .' ~. ,_,
a funerary chamber: where were four posts laid close
3__~' i:L~'tJ ;
;,.ff,,:t:.-
Fig.22.Theoakcoffinfoundin theburialfrom
' ..'~
_ AM to the corners of the pit, which supported lateral and

. . '."'..
transversal beams and had a wooden roof.

Sprancenata(PREDA 1986,132). The funerary discovery from Sprancenata is
truly unique in the Dacian world because it is the only one that had steps, a funerary chamber, a coffin53,
and was located in the middle of a settlement.54A question that immediately arises is why there were so
few human remains, but PREDA(1986, 51) suggests a very plausible scenario: it is unlikely that the grave
was robbed since the skeleton should have only been disturbed, not taken out; instead he thinks that
both the gravegoods and the skeleton were taken by the inhabitants, who abandoned the settlement at
the middle of the 15tcentury AD even though no destruction layer was noticed.55It is almost impossible
52. Which were unfortunately considered insignificant by the author of the excavation (PREDA1986,51).
53. Although this may also be due to taphonomic processes.
54. There have been human bones found within settlements (in pits or just scattered around), but those are thought as coming
from human sacrifices.
55. The absence of a destruction layer makes Preda's assumption about the disappearance of the skeleton even more plausi-
ble since the other solution would have been an intentional desecration by enemies, because the place obviously had an
important religious significance to the community; however, if this were the case, there should have been more signs of
'enemy activity' inside the settlement.
~
to even take a wild guess as to the mean- n
ing behind this impressive funerary

discovery. It is obvious through its loca-
tion (Fig. 23) that the burial was central
to the community members and to the
settlement itself; it was a focal point and
probably the place where important ritu-
als took place. If the skeleton and funer-
ary inventory were indeed taken when
the settlement was abandoned, it means
that the very existence of the community Fig.23.PlanofSpnlncenatawiththeburialhighlighted
was linked to the deceased; he/she must (afterPREDA 1986,16).
have been the very element that defined its members; those remains would have been the essence of
their identity. Did they belong to someone who they thought came down from some mythical ances-
tor? Or was he/she seen as a prophet of some sort? Unfortunately such questions cannot be answered. A
striking thing is that even though the settlement was founded in the 2ndcentury BC, the burial was only
built in the 1stcentury AD, in the last phase of its existence. Two possible scenarios come to my mind so
as to explain this chronological gap: either the community suffered a sudden change in identity in the 1st
century AD, which would fit with the adolescent being a prophet, sent by the gods; or the chronology is
wrong, since the burial is dated through the dirt that came out of the pit and which belonged to the final
level of inhabitance. The pit could have been backfilled by the community members when they took
the skeleton and abandoned the settlement, which means that the burial could have been constructed
as the settlement was established, thus making it highly plausible for the adolescent to be seen as either
descending from mythical ancestors, or as being sacrificed when the dava was founded. The funerary
chamber built on top would have been a constant reminder of this event and it is likely that there would
have been periodic rituals to commemorate and/or reiterate it, thereby maintaining alive the identity of
the community.
To sum up, the burials from Spnkenata and from Cugir exemplify the variety in the expression
of identity. While some people saw their community as being defined by a person or an event from the
past, others thought that their martial skills, their wealth and their power were what better illustrated
who they are. Some chose to inhume their 'important dead: other to cremate them; some built funerary
chambers in settlements, others constructed mounds on hillsides. They all might have shared similar
forms of material culture (i.e. 'Geto-Dacian') but were by all accounts unique.
Conclusion. Searchingfor Dacian Identity

Who were the Dacians? I think that this question, which I attempted to answer in the introduc-
tion of this paper, needs to be given a different answer now that the burial eyidence has been presented.
The Dacians were not just "the noblest as well as the most just of all the Thracian tribes" as Herodotus
wrote; they were not just Burebista and Decebalus; they were not just the enemies of Rome; they were
many, many more things than that.
The Dacian communities were very diverse. They actively and dynamically responded to the
world around them, the social intersections and political machinations that were taking place in the
Late La Tene and that affected them. One of the most fascinating responses was the intentional modifi-
cation of the funerary rituals leading to the appearance of 'alien' burials. The chronology of these tombs,
although extremely general, suggests that they represented an immediate reaction to the Roman pres-
sure, on the one hand, and to the conflicts that led to military and political 'unification, on the other. 56
These two elements threatened to 'dilute' the identity of the Dacian communities and maybe even their
very existence. The burials however counterbalanced this effect as they represented events when com-
munal identity was openly expressed; the bonds that held together the members of the group were thus
strengthened. Some elements of their identity entailed substantial regional ties (e.g. the burials from
56. The idea that they represented an immediate reaction is also indicated by another element of the chronology: where small
necropolises where erected, all the burials that have been excavated were dated roughly to the same time period. Hence
the 'bending' of the funerary ritual is likely to have been cause by the same event.
418 I CATALIN NICOLAE PaPA
Transilvania) while other indicated the unique character of the community (e.g. Sprancenata) leading
to very diverse narratives.
The Late La Tene people of Romania utilised a great range of objects so as to signal their identity.
First of all, weapons were used to refer to the martial activities of the deceased and to the military power
of the community. It appears that many of the groups from Transilvania, but some from Muntenia as
well, considered that their warlike activities represented the most important element of their identity.
The weapon that signalled martial prowess par excellencewas the sica followed by the lance. In very few
cases a full panoply was displayed, constituting of sica, lance, LT D longsword, shield, chain mail, hel-
met, Thracian-type horse-gear. When all these objects did occur together exceptional military skills and
great wealth are indicated.
Another category of objects which appeared to have been employed extensively were clothing
accessories and adornments: fibulae, buttons, beads, rings, pendants, etc. The items were made of iron,
bronze, silver or gold and despite their regular occurrence in tombs were not found in large quantities,
even though in some graves (Le.Cugir T2, Poiana T1, Pope~ti T2, Tili~caM1 and M2) there were several
items of this type. Most of the burials that contained such items did not usually have weapons, though
at Cugir T2 for example both categories were present. The identity suggested by the presence of clothing
accessories and adornments was diverse though it could imply things like prosperity57, wide regional
connections or isolation. 58
Continuing on this idea, the vast majority of objects that were part of the funerary inventory
were produced in Dacian workshops. There were some Greek and Roman imports, especially amphora
and kantharoi59, plus the bronze situla from Cugir T2, which of course relate to extensive commercial
relations, but their numbers were generally low. It seems that these objects were genuinely incorporated
so as to express identity only in the case of the Moldavian davae60and possibly Pope~ti to a certain
degree. This implies that their commercial relations influenced the way they regarded themselves; their
identity was referenced not only to the neighbouring communities but also to those located much far-
ther away, such as the Greek colonies from the Black Sea. It doesn't appear that they were necessarily
used as prestige objects since the same items were found abundantly in the settlements and thus we can-
not consider them extraordinary finds.61Furthermore, since many were imitations of Greek and Roman
forms, it is possible that we are dealing with the integration of such 'foreign' elements but adapted to the
local conditions.
Building on the previous observation, I think that what the Dacian burials indicate is the
existence of several layers of identity. In most cases the main idea refers to a local identity; different
sets of elem~nts (e.g. incineration, in tumulus grave, containing iron fibula, silver buttons, 'fruit bowl:
arrowheads, etc.) were employed so as to create specific combinations. This situation occurred because
each community used material culture in a different manner which led to them structuring their world
in unique ways. Since identity is based on the similarities shared by the members of the same group
(JONES1999) it is only natural that we obtain the expression of highly localised identities. On top of the
first layer, sometimes a regional identity can be spotted, especially through the repeated combination
of a specific set of items. This layer is more evident in some graves than in other, and stronger in same
geographical areas (Le. Transilvania and Moldova) than in other (Le. Muntenia and Oltenia). It is hard
to determine however the extent to which those people saw themselves as being part of a larger regional
entity, but it is fair to say that in most cases, maybe with the exception of some of the warrior-like burials
(e.g. Blandiana, Teleac), it is the local identity that came first.
Finally there is the question about the existence of a third layer, that of a Dacian ethnicity. I
think that the burials from Late La Tene Romania do not show any evidence for the formation of a clear
Dacian ethnic marker; there are no elements which recur in such a manner so as to indicate an ethnic
57. Prosperity may be real, and thus the community could have really defined itself through its economic situation, or 'not so
real: meaning that the community put forward the image of richness because it best suited its interest.
58. This is suggested through size of the area within which they were encountered; hence some objects had a large circulation
(e.g. many of the iron fibulae and pendants) while other were local forms.
59. Even though many were local imitations of Greek and Roman objects.
60. With the exception of Brad; the imports were only present there in the flat grave situated in a different area than the
cemetery.
61. Except maybe for the situla from Cugir T2 and some of the finds from the tombs from Poiana (Galati).
-
consciousness. The existence of a 'Geto-Dacian' ethnicity would have triggered in the burial record the
construction of specific ethnic sets; these sets could have changed significantly or even totally in time
and from a region to another62but some linkage between them should have been noticeable. If the 'alien'
funerary phenomenon was caused primarily by the rising Roman pressure, the Dacian ethnicity should
have been extremely obvious in the tombs, since the communities would have expressed how they dif-
fer from the same 'other' (i.e. the Romans). If, on the other hand, these mortuary practices had as their
main agent the regional battles for military and political control, then it would be normal for localised
identity markers to be used extensively. However, as it is unlikely that the communities would have gone
to such a great length so as to completely hide their assumed ethnicity, it is much more probable that it
was never there. Therefore the evidence seems to point that the 'unquestioned, glorious Geto-Dacian
nation' is nothing more than a modern myth.
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List of figures
Fig. 1. Maximum expansion of the Dacians.

Fig. 2. Important events in the existence of the Dacians.
Fig. 3. Geographical map of Romania with important features marked.
Fig.4. The regions of Romania.
Fig.S. The three 'images' of the deceased.
Fig. 6. The neighbours of the Dacians (map produced using Google Earth).
Fig. 7. The location of the Orii~tie Mountains and Sarmizegetusa.
Fig. 8.1. 'Sacred area' ofSarmizegetusa (GHEORGHIU2005, 349).1. string; 2. wall; 3. paved road; 4. channel;
5. stairs; 6. temple with plinths; 7. dismantled plinths; 8. stone pilasters; 9. hearth; 10. wooden
pilasters; 11. threshold; 12. curb; 13. arrow of andesite sun; 14. andesite sun; 15. entrance platform;
16. terraces.
-
Fig. 8.2. Great circular temple and rectangular temple from Sarmizegetusa (GHEORGHIU2005, 345, 347).
Fig. 9. Silver objects from Sarcsau hoard (GHEORGHIU2005, 479).
Fig. 10. The location of the Daciari burials and the zones they define. 1. Hunedoara-Gradina Castelului;
2. Calan; 3. Coste~ti-Cetatuie; 4. Cugir; 5. Tartaria; 6. Blandiana; 7. Teleac; 8. Tili~ca; 9. Poiana
(Gorj); 10. Grop~ani; 11. Spnlncenata; 12. Cepari; 13. Cetateni; 14. Orbeasca de Sus; 15. Laceni;
16. Zimnicea; 17. Pope~ti; 18. Radovanu; 19. Piscu Crasani; 20. Brad; 21. Racatau; 22. Poiana
(Galati).
Fig. 11. Categories of objects found in the burials from Transilvania.
Fig. 12. Sicae found in burials. 1. from Blandiana (GHEORGHIU2005, 509); 2. from Radovanu (VULPE
1976).
Fig. 13. Sicae from Trajan's column (after COARELLI2000).
Fig. 14. Categories of objects found in the burials from Muntenia and eastern Oltenia.
Fig. 15. Plan of the area ofPope~ti (after VULPE1955).
Fig. 16. 'Fruit bowls: 1-2. from Craiva (GHEORGHIU2005, 405); 3-4. from Sprancenata (PREDA 1986,
159).
Fig. 17. Categories of objects found in the burials from Moldova.
Fig. 18. Number of burials per time interval.
Fig. 19. Number of burials in each period/region.
Fig. 20. Cugir, objects found in tumulus nr. 2; 1-4. iron,S. gold. (SiRBU-ARSENESCU2006, 181).
Fig. 21. General view of the dava from Sprancenata (PREDA1986, 131).
Fig. 22. The oak coffin found in the burial from Sprancenata (PREDA1986, 132).
Fig. 23. Plan of Sprancenata with the burial highlighted (after PREDA1986, 16).
List of illustrations
Illustration 1. 1. The movement of the 'wave' of Dacia burials; 2. The reaction to the Roman pressure as
suggested by the burial evidence; 3. The reaction to the battles for political control suggested
by the burial evidence. 1. Hunedoara-Gradina Castelului;2. Calan; 3. Coste~ti-Cetatuie;
4. Cugir; 5. Tartaria; 6. Blandiana; 7. Teleac; 8. Tili~ca; 9. Poiana (Gorj); 10. Grop~ani;
11. Sprancenata; 12. Cepari; 13. Cetateni; 14. Orbeasca de Sus; 15. Laceni; 16. Zimnicea;
17. Pope~ti;18. Radovanu; 19. Piscu Crasani; 20. Brad; 21. Racatau; 22. Poiana (Galati).

A New Framework For Approaching Dacian Identity

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A New Framework For Approaching Dacian Identity

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.....

A NEW FRAMEWORK FOR APPROACHING DACIAN IDENTITY

CataIin Nicolae POPA

Keywords: La Tene, Romania, Dacians, burials, identity

Iron Age Communities in the Carpathian Basin,2010,p. 395-423

Who were the Dacians?

"incrementa Romans control

Fig. 2. Important events in the existence of the Dacians.

Fig.3. Geographical map of Romania Fig. 4. The regions of Romania.

398 I CATALIN NICOLAE POPA

I. Past approaches to Dacian burials

II. Approaching the Dacian burials

II.1. Interpreting burials

reflect Ion 0f an IIIdIVIdua 1s l1e

11.2. Going beyond burials

A New Frameworkfor Approaching Dacian Identity. The Burial Contribution I 403

11.3. The larger Dacian'picture'

Fig. 8.1. 'Sacred area' ofSarmizegetusa (GHEORGHIU2005,349).

III. The Identity behind the Dacian burials

IlL 1. General considerations

10 the Transilvanian funerary ritual was mar-

tant Scor d ISC IIIfluence (SPANU 2002 , 99) .

any general patterns for this region.

ond and forth tumuli from Pope~ti ~({; '?'

present a different situation. The burials were

equipment that could have been used in battle.

Fig. 19.Number of burials in each period/region.

111.2. Case studies

~c~ ~d for riding. After the incineration, the ashes

-~ ~-ehow clay and on top of this was placed a small,

-g 'rapezOl dal attachments

. -;,.:;~m which sealed the grave.

:t is quite clear that we are faced with the : 11I

-~~=~<; from a very elaborate ritual that was care-

_ AM to the corners of the pit, which supported lateral and

transversal beams and had a wooden roof.

to even take a wild guess as to the mean- n

ing behind this impressive funerary

Conclusion. Searchingfor Dacian Identity

JORDANES Jordanes,Latin- English, First half. Availableat: http://www.harbornet.com/folks/theedrich/

SiRBU 1993 Sirbu, V, Credinfe~ipracticifunerare, religioase~imagicein lumea geto-dacilor:(pornind de

Fig. 1. Maximum expansion of the Dacians.

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