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Gudovac - Gradina 2004.
Tatjana Tkalčec
Abstract
Gudovac-Gradina is a medieval lowland hill-fort located in the northern part of the village of Gudovac, about 7 km south-west of Bjelovar. The hill-fort was built in a swampy area, ca 50 m west of Plavnica Stream. The central elevation (high ground) is fortified by a broad moat and a defensive wall which is best preserved on the northern side, and in a broader surrounding area an entire system of walls and moats can be discerned which served to defend the fortification and to communicate with a smaller hill-fort - Mala Gradina, ca 500 m away, that probably functioned as a guard-house (Fig. 1). Finds of moulds and tiles for luxurious tile stoves, the kind used to be produced at the Budapest royal court towards the end of the fifteenth century, were found in the hill-fort of Gudovac. Numerous important finds have been known since the beginning of the twentieth century as a result of amateur digging. Professional archaeological excavations brought to light a whole number of other representative examples of tiles, as well as fragments of ceramic vessels and glasses, majolica glasses and majolica decorative plates, which were imports in Gudovac. Furthermore, there are finds of stone projectiles, iron arrows, numerous ceramic pots, knives, animal bones, etc. As a rare item an Easter egg was found, decorated by waxing techniques.
The excavations were conducted at the central elevation in the area towards the northern defensive wall (Fig. 2). In the upper layers traces of burning and holes from columns that used to support wooden structures were unearthed. A thick layer of leveling the surface was found, representing the border between the younger and older medieval horizon. Archaeological excavations show that the younger medieval intervention was undertaken in order to expand the surface of the central high ground and to cover the wide moat, which originally separated the central elevation from the smaller one in the north. Thus in the older medieval phase, according to its shape, the site used to be a so-called dual hill-fort. The conducted analysis of animal remains from the younger phase layers points to the use of small domestic bovine animals - ca 114 cm high (Bos taurus) for milk and food, as well as of domestic pigs (Sus domesticus), whereas the remains of wild animal species such as red deer (Cervus elaphus) and roe (Capreolus capreolus) are few in number. Birds are also represented - hens (Gallus sp.), geese (Anser sp.), grouses (Tetrastes bonasia) and wild hens (Gallus gallus) as well as hares (Lepus europaeus). The shell specimens Anodanta cygnea, Unio sp. and Sphaerium rivicola enable an estimate of the water class rating.
The newly discovered deep moat is not visible in the present soil configuration. Beneath the layers of leveling the moat, at ca 3 m, well-preserved remains of an imploded and demolished wooden structure - worked oak planks and beams, as well as round beech logs and stakes were found. The imploded structure or a room between the central and the additional northern elevations originally rested upon massive wooden pilots, i.e. on a bridge over a water-filled moat between the two elevated structures (Fig. 2). Beneath the layer of worked planks, beams - construction material - there was a layer rich with numerous pots for preserving and cooking food, as well as a layer rich with finds of other kitchen or pantry utensils: iron knives, dippers, pans, hen and goose eggs, a large number of animal bones, etc. In an extraordinarily humid medium fragments of clothing and footwear could be preserved, as well as numerous archaeobotanical finds. The bottom of the moat was reached at the depth of 3.80 m of the present ground surface. A semicircular row of wooden beams was found near a slope of the central elevation. Beams beneath the bridge construction with the room were staked vertically. Beams still staked around the central high ground, that are not linked with the bridge construction, are staked diagonally (their bottom part being staked in the slope of the central elevation). It is presumed that their tops were also sharpened and that they served as an additional defensive element of the central high ground, at the same time reinforcing its slopes in construction terms (Fig. 2, Fig. 3). Archaeological excavations have shown that the hill-fort of Gudovac in the Late Middle Ages was a fortified noblemen’s homestead, where along with the complex coexistence of noblemen and their servants, tile stoves were also manufactured.
This site was settled since prehistoric times (a Neolithic layer was found), probably also in Classical Antiquity (individual finds within medieval layers) up to the Middle Ages. Finds from excavations conducted so far point to the Late Middle Ages, and two phases can be distinguished: an older one (fifteenth century, when the site had a shape of a dual hillfort) and a younger one (when the moat was covered up and leveled, a central high ground was remade and enlarged and new structures were built). Finds from the layers of moat leveling and those of the imploded room are typologically dated into the second half and the end of the fifteenth century. The result of the analysis of C14 wood samples from the moat was 460 ± 65 BP, i.e. the calibration scope is AD 1400-1500 AD (with 64,1% probability). The result of the C14 analysis of a burned beam from layer SU 5 (structure from the younger phase of the hill-fort) was 315 ± 80 BP (AD 1480-1650 AD, 68,2%), and of the sample of the sharpened diagonally staked beam from the slope of the central elevation from the older phase of the hill-fort 420 ± 65 BP (AD 1420-1520 AD; 55,3%). Such absolute dates confirm the dating of the finds and the existence of a younger and an older phase of the hill-fort, but of course as we mentioned the continuity of life at the site goes back to prehistory. Only a continuation of the excavations will answer the question of weather the original hill-fort was founded in the fifteenth century, or it was first reshaped and reconstructed in that period due to the needs of the time and the wishes of the propertyowners, only to be reconstructed second time later in the very end of the Late Middle Ages. Historical data point to the possibility of building the hill-fort at the beginning of the fourteenth century, as magister Gud (after which the village acquired its name) was mentioned. The culmination of the life in the hill-fort was in the second half of the fifteenth and at the very beginning of the sixteenth century during magister Petar who was viceprotonotarius regni Sclavoniae, vicarius temporalis episcopatus Zagrabiensis, vicarius in materialibus and was closely linked not only with the Church, but also with the royal court in Buda. Around 1543 the hill-fort changed its function from being a noblemen’s estate into being one in a series of fortifications that defended against the Ottomans. The decline of the hill-fort can be supposed to have occurred around the mid-sixteenth century, as it ceased being mentioned in historical sources, or somewhat later, as confirmed also by the C14 dates.
Keywords
lowland hill-fort; fifteenth century; stove production workshop; stove-tiles; fortified homestead; construction elements
Hrčak ID:
667
URI
Publication date:
23.3.2005.
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