Archaeological collection
The lifeline of the archaeological collection is almost the same as the museum’s. The collection was mainly put together by gathering antique objects that turned up from the ground. In the middle of the 19th century, count Antal Apponyi has urged the sorting of the gathered findings stored in the archives room. The general assembly of Tolna County has agreed an order about setting up a museum and to submit the different offerings to the general assembly. The basis of the collection is mostly made up of different offerings. They made an announcement in the Tolna County Journal in 1874, in which they asked for help and support to collect the museum’s objects. The offering of the doctor from Paks, dr. Sándor Novák, came also in these times; he has offered a part of his private collection to the museum. By setting up the county’s monograph, the collection process of archaeological objects got in swing again. Ernő Kammerer did not work alone with the preparation of the monograph, the archeological parts were written by Mór Wosinsky. Facing many difficulties, he did his work by ranging over the whole county. As the systematic exploration was financed by the Hungarian National Museum, the majority of the collected material came into their possession. In 1895, the monograph got ready, which is until now a relevant source of the county’s archaeology, as most of the findings used to put together the monograph were destroyed. Mór Wosinsky came up first with the necessity of establishing a museum in 1985, because, as mentioned before, the material gathered for the monograph was not left in the county. The established museum, which was placed into the city’s gymnasium, had four departments. The first department contained the “archaeological, historical and numismatical” findings and memories. Today this is divided into three separate collections. Thanks to the fast growing of the material, the number of classrooms for museum purposes has risen from three to all available. The collection consisted of app 33.000 pieces, which were supposedly mainly archaeological findings. After the museum was moved into its own building, the collection developed further, the available space for the material soon seemed to be hardly enough. Nowadays only the archaeological and the numismatical findings are kept in the main building. As a summary, we can say, that thanks to the preventive excavations connected to the large investments of the recent years, the archaeological collection has doubled since ’90-s. The more than 100 years old collection is regarding the covered timescale of the exhibited objects also wider than at the time of the museum’s establishment. This is also related to the expansion of the archaeology’s research area. Earlier, the timescale from the Paleolithic age until the settlement of the Magyars in the Carpathian Basin was regarded as the research field of the archaeology, so this was the basis for the collecting also. Now the borderline is set up at the end of the Turkish occupation, in 1686, but depending on the aims. Archaeology of the Early Modern Times also deals with objects from the 19th century (e.g. research of the pottery centrals). The archaeological collection does not only consist of object findings, but also of documentation made during the explorations, including survey drawings and photos. The museum suffered serious damages in World War II, big part of the collection and the data archives was destroyed. After World War II, important findings were added to the museum’s collection. Different materials from finding-rescue works and planned excavations made the institution richer. So got such findings into the collection, as the material of a grave from the early copper and bronze age in Pári; bronze age treasure findings from Nagyvejke; artifacts of a lord from the bronze age in Bátaszék; golden and silver jewels from a grave of an Alan mother superior at Regöly; and Lombard grave findings from Kajdacs, Tamási and Gyönk. At that time explorations were also performed at the Árpád age Abbey in the yard of the Town Hall of Szekszárd, at Dunaföldvár’s castle and the Turkish pale castle in Szekszárd-Palánk (Jeni Palánk). The finding material of these explorations got also into the museum’s collection. The monumental and archaeological research of the castle in Ozora resulted besides the observations also in a remarkable amount of findings. Besides the renaissance stones and the metal objects, the two treasure findings (coins and filigree) from the castle’s cellar are of high importance. Some artifacts stemming from the territory of the market town, Ete got into the museum in the 1960’s. The latest explorations resulted in such artifact findings, as a unique procession cross, among several other bronze objects, the full stock of a pottery, negatives for making stove tiles and some finished products. Other grave excavations were done at Fadd-Jegeshegy (graves from the Hungarian settlement’s age and from the Middle Ages), and at Dombóvár-Békató (graves from the 16-17th century). During the preventive excavation of the present M9 clearway, settlement-parts and graves from the Neolithic to the late Middle Ages were found. The now running preventive excavations of the M6 highway in the South of Tolna County already brought findings from the Neolithic to the late Middle Ages. A part of our collection can be seen in our exhibitions, the others are introduced in publications of our yearbooks and exhibition guides. The collections data archive can be researched with permission.
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