Medieval cemetery at the Ilok-Krstbajer site

Siniša Krznar,1 Andrea Rimpf,2 Kristina Turkalj 1

1 Institute of Archaeology, Zagreb

2 Ilok city museum, Ilok

The Ilok-Krstbajer site is located in the eastern part of Ilok, about 200
meters west of the border crossing to Serbia. The site was partially
destroyed during the exploitation of sand for the construction purposes,
so Ilok City Museum in cooperation with the Institute of Archaeology
carried out the rescue archaeological excavation. In the most endangered
part of the site, along the edge of the loess profile, three archaeological
exploratory seasons (2015 - 2017) were carried out. In the upper layers of
the site there was a medieval cemetery, and underneath it, the prehistoric
(Sopot) objects. The total open area of the archaeological probe amounts
to 84 m2. Within this area, 188 graves were explored. All the graves show
common characteristics. They all were west – east oriented. Due to the
very dense burials there are numerous overlapping and devastation of
older graves. The deceased are laid on their backs, with their outstretched
legs and buried in simple pits without grave architecture, but often in
wooden coffins. Fig. 1 Location of the site on the Austro-Hungarian map
from the 19th century

On the basis of some small finds

Fig. 2 Position of the excavated graves
(drawn by: K. Turkalj)
(garments, jewellery, money) and 14C
dates, the graveyard continuance can be
dated from the end of the 12th to the
transition from the 15th to the 16th century.
The anthropological analysis was
conducted on the deceased from two
excavation seasons - 2015 and 2016 (22
men, 22 women, 31 children and 15
persons whose sex could not be
determined). Analysis revealed the
presence of numerous fractures and
pathologies such as tuberculosis,
meningitis or scurvy.
Fig. 3 Earring from grave 15
(photo by: A. Rimpf)

Fig. 4 S-circlet from grave 186 Fig. 5 Rings from grave 65 in situ
(photo by: E. Balić) (photo by: A. Rimpf) Fig. 6 Unhealed fractures of
left ribs from the grave
63 (photo by: M. Novak)