Avars in the 9th century AD. The state of the historical and archaeological research

This chapter reviews the state of historical and archaeological research on the fate of Avar-period population and culture in the 9th-century Carpathian Basin after the fall of the Avar Khaganate as a political organization. It summarizes the Frankish–Avar wars and the last mention of an Avar delegation (822). Drawing on the Legend of Cyril, the Conversio Bagoariorum et Carantanorum, Regino of Prüm and De Administrando Imperio, it argues that the Avar ethnos survived at least until the Hungarian Conquest and in some regions, such as Croatia, even afterwards, so that views of a complete "slavisation" based mainly on toponyms are wrong. The chapter criticises archaeological chronologies that adapt the last late Avar phase to political events as "mixed reasoning". Using radiocarbon dates and horizontal stratigraphy, notably from Hortobágy-Árkus, it describes a late Avar chronology that "unfolds like an accordion": the last ornate belt sets date to the first third or first half of the 9th century, while spiral and multiple S-ended pendants and other jewellery types appeared from the late 7th or early 8th century. It discusses the limits of radiocarbon dating caused by the 774–775 wave and subsequent plateau in the calibration curve, and shows in two tables that, for the late 8th and early 9th centuries, less probable intervals within the 2σ range may fit archaeological and dendrochronological dates better. The chapter concludes that elements of Avar deep culture, crafts and jewellery survived into the 10th century, while 9th-century graves outside Carolingian Pannonia remain difficult to identify.