Oppidum Stradonice, Josef Ladislav Píč, and Joseph Déchelette
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7 Oppidum Stradonice, Josef Ladislav Píč, and Joseph Déchelette Karel Sklenář ABSTRACT The discovery of aCeltic oppidum near Stradonice in Central Bohemia attracted the attention of the Czech archaeologist J. L. Píč at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries and then of the French oppidum researcher J. Déchelette, who translated Píč’sbook on Stradonice into French. The controversy about the dating of the site was significant for further research, in which Píč tried to interpret Stradonice as the seat of the Germanic ruler Marobuduus from around the turn of the eras, while Déchelette, supported by archaeological finds, correctly identified Stradonice as aCeltic oppidum that had disappeared before the end of the 1st century BC.The article proves that both of these interpretations did not originate only then, but had adeeper tradition in Czech archaeology. KEYWORDS Bohemia; Stradonice; oppidum; La Tène period; Celts; Marobudum; Joseph Déchelette; Josef Ladislav Píč. INTRODUCTION Perhaps the most interesting chapter in the history of Franco -Czech archaeological relations was written at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries by two scholars joined by their interest in Celtic oppida– Joseph Déchelette and Josef Ladislav Píč. Their paths met while studying the finds from and information about Hradiště near Stradonice, the most important of the Celtic oppida in Bohemia, but they diverged on the question of the historical interpretation of this site of European importance. The main difference was that Píč, referring to historical sources, tried to interpret Stradonice as the seat of the Germanic ruler Marobuduus from around the turn of the millennium, while Déchelette, supported by archaeological findings, identified Stradonice as aCeltic oppidum that had disappeared before the end of the 1st century BC.Acloser look shows that these interpretations did not arise only at the time of their collaboration, but have adeeper tradition in Czech archaeology. Thanks to the importance of both of these scholars for the development of archaeology in their respective countries, the story of their relationship has often been the subject of interest. It was more often so with French archaeologists, who have already paid alot of attention to Déchelette, his work, and his connections, while in Czech archaeology the interest in Píč was sidelined for decades after his opponents had the upper hand in their disputes. It is understandable that without adequate evidence from the Czech side of the story the usual French view of the period of their collaboration is somewhat simplistic. It is therefore appropriate to clarify this matter from abroader perspective. STUDIA HERCYNIA XXVII/2, 7–36
8STUDIA HERCYNIA XXVII/2 JOSEF LADISLAV PÍČ PRIOR TO STRADONICE Josef Ladislav Píč1 (1847–1911) (Fig. 1), aprivate professor of history at Charles University in Prague, was the last significant student of Jan Erazim Vocel (1802–1871), who was the founder of archaeology as adiscipline on its own in Bohemia and its first professor at the said university. Píč first worked as agrammar school professor of history, focusing on the more recent periods of Central and Eastern Europe. Later he decided to continue Vocel’sunfinished project and write acultural history of the Czech nation from its very beginnings. Because– like Vocel– he understood that he could not carry out such aproject without first working on the prehistory of Bohemia, he concentrated vigorously on this task from the late 1880sonwards. In 1893, he became the first ‘custos’ (director) of the collections of prehistoric and classical archaeology at the National Museum 2 in Prague, which had just become an independent collection department on its own (Sklenář 2013a). He also held other important positions in Czech archaeology– with the exception of the chair of archaeology at Prague University, where Lubor Niederle (1865–1944), ageneration younger than him, was habilitated at the same time. Unlike the historian Píč, Niederle switched to archaeology from anthropology and sociology, which influenced his approach and caused the first controversy between them. Niederle, in close association with the purely positivist archaeologist Karel Buchtela (1864–1946) was the epicentre of the ‘university school’, focusing on the material side of archaeology. In contrast, Píč’saim was to paint apicture of cultural history based on archaeological sources read in the key of history– ahigher goal, but one that was harder to achieve at the time. 1 On him recently Karasová– Salač 2003; Sklenář 2005, 438–440; Sklenář 2013a; 2013b. 2 This term is used here as asubstitute of the various names of the institution used in 1818–1918. In the times of Píč and Déchelette its official title was Museum království Českého (the Museum of the Kingdom of Bohemia). Fig. 1: Josef Ladislav Píč in the 1890s.
9KAREL SKLENÁŘ In constant conflict with his opponents from the ‘university school’ over both the overall concept and specific approaches in archaeology (Sklenář 2013b), Píč began to publish the large, lavishly illustrated volumes of his life’swork, Antiquities of Bohemia, in 1899. Even his greatest rival called the series ‘aliterary feat of the first rank’. After the first two volumes, devoted to Stone Age and Bronze Age Mound cultures, Píč reached the period of the Celtic occupation of Bohemia in the third volume (Píč 1902). France had been the centre of research on Celtic history and archaeology from the early 19th century. While in the German -speaking countries, interest in the Celts was increasingly supplanted after the mid-19th century by anationalistic preference for the protohistoric Germans, in France the Celts/Gauls naturally remained the enduring focus of interest for archaeologists and historians alike. Apart from Celtic archaeology, only the Palaeolithic research was strongly asserted (though cultivated, of course, mainly by natural scientists), while other components of prehistory attracted much less attention. With this on his mind, J. L. Píč travelled to the museums of Western Europe around the turn of the century (with agood knowledge of French and, of course, German) in order to learn about Celtic archaeology in its homeland before proceeding to describe the Second Iron Age in Bohemia. He first became acquainted with the francophone countries in 1896, when, after travelling through the Rhineland, he diverted via Strasbourg to Paris and Brussels, returning via Mulhouse and Besançon to Switzerland (Neuchâtel, Lausanne, Geneva, Bern, Zurich) and southern Germany. While this journey was rather exploratory, by 1900 Píč was already cruising through France very deliberately, making very purposeful provision for works on the ‘Celtic’ (La Tène) part of his Antiquities. He only rushed through Germany to concentrate on museums and monuments along the route of Metz– Nancy– Épinal– Besançon– Dijon– Autun– Nevers– Mulins– Roanne– Lyon– Annecy– Nîmes– Narbonne– Toulouse– Clermont -Ferrand– Bourges– Orléans– Tours– Poitiers– Niort– Nantes– Vannes– Rennes– Paris– Reims– Châtillon– Troyes, returning home via Basel, Bern, and Munich. The following year, 1901, his journey to the archaeology of the European Celts was more extensive: he went to Cologne, passed through Belgium (Liège– Namur– Brussels), crossed the Channel, went to London and then west to Dublin, and finally returned via Boulogne to Amiens– Rouen– Dieppe– Brest– Quimper– Carnac– Vannes– Angers– Paris– Bar -le -Duc– Strasbourg– Haguenau– Worms– Mainz and to Prague. The last archaeological trip to the west, where he had already seen everything that he needed (the contents of the following volumes of Antiquities called rather for connections to the east), was undertaken by Píč in 1902. From Frankfurt am Main he went to Mainz– Worms– Bonn– Paris– Autun– Genève– Lausanne– Neuchâtel– Biel– Bern– Zurich– Donaueschingen– Munich, and back home. Everywhere he went, from France to Russia, as well as at home, his extroverted, jovial, and bon vivant personality helped him forge numerous, often long -lasting friendships. The main focus of his travels was initially museums with material from Celtic inhumation graves, referred to in France as the Marne culture. Graves with identical bronze and iron furnishing had been known to Czech archaeology from the 1840s, but it was only J. E. Vocel, in his Prehis‑ tory of the Bohemia (Wocel 1866, 192–196; Wocel 1868) who described the bronzes from them as agroup on its own and dated them to the Roman Imperial period without commenting on the ethnicity of their makers. This was the consequence of his brilliant pioneering attempt to create achronology of bronze artefacts based on their chemical composition: he placed the La Tène period bronzes in an evolutionary sequence between the Bronze Age and ‘Merovingian’ artefacts, but since he– in accordance with the general opinion of his period– considered the
10 STUDIA HERCYNIA XXVII/2 Fig. 2: Title page of the J. L. Píč volume on the burials of the Marne (La Tène) culture in Bohemia (Píč 1902).
11KAREL SKLENÁŘ Bronze Age artefacts to be Celtic, the actual Celtic bronzes in Bohemia must, according to his system, have belonged to the Roman period. About 40 years later, Píč approached the issue of aCeltic presence from adifferent position. He had to take into account that from the 16th century onwards, Czech chronicles and historical works considered the tribe of Boii (them being Celts was disputed until the mid19th century) to be the earliest known ethnic group in Bohemia. Already in the Renaissance the very name of the country was believed to have derived from this ethnonym. Looking at the Czech archaeological material, Píč observed agroup of inhumation graves with bronze and iron objects, corresponding both to the La Tène culture in western central Europe and to the Marne culture in France,3 attributed there to the Celts. Because he saw the centre of this culture on the Marne and the middle reaches of the Seine, where the La Tène inhumation graves had been studied for the first time on alarger scale,4 he set off to France. After his return, he compiled the third volume of Antiquities with the subtitle Skeletal Graves with the Marne or La Tène Culture and the Boii in Bohemia (Píč 1902) (Fig. 2). This volume is in fact acomprehensive study of the history and archaeology of the Celts in Europe (including archaeological maps of Celtic Europe), and only the afterword summarizes the findings specific to Bohemia, documented by the first catalogue of the La Tène sites. To some extent, Píč thus responded to aprophecy formulated shortly before by Virchow who claimed that Bohemia would become akey area for the understanding of the Celtic issue (and their origin) in Central Europe (Virchow 1895). Píč in his monograph discussed in detail the individual types of finds from Bohemia setting them in the context of his vast knowledge gathered in European museums and in bibliography. In both senses, even though working on abroad scope from England to Hungary, French sources played asignificant role– the largest number of parallels came from French museums and French literature was extensively quoted (notably Morel 1898; Mortillet– Mortillet 1881). His conclusion was that (with the exception of the pottery) the inhumation graves in Bohemia show the closest affinities with the burials on the Marne (he actually found the Marne culture in Bohemia in its pure form), so that ‘there can be no doubt of their being of the same origin and of their being closely related by blood’5 (Píč 1902, 51). In addition, it should be remembered that under the influence of his travels to the western half of Europe, Píč stretched the history of the Central European Celts further back into prehistory. He referred to the culture of the southern and western Bohemian burial mounds, beginning in the Middle Bronze Age and surviving, according to him, to the 4th (3rd?) century BC, to the great ‘nation that sat from Southern Bohemia to the Loire and still occupied aconsiderable part of Gaul in Caesar’stime’6 (Píč 1900, 133), i.e., broadly to the Celts. However, he did not identify it with the historical Boii whose name he attributed only to the inhumation graves characterised by the Marne or La Tène culture. He dated their arrival from their original area of the Marne culture to the central and northern part of Bohemia to around 400 BC (Píč 1902, 157–160). The main difference he saw between the two areas was, that the principal feature of Caesar’sTransalpine Gaul was the presence of towns, whereas ‘no trace of Gallic cities has yet been found in Bohemia’ (Píč 1902, 159). Yet he already knew asite in Bohemia corresponding to the concept of oppida, though he did not consider it Celtic: it was Stradonice. 3 Píč considered the term ‘La Tène’ to be appropriate only for the later phase of this culture and thus used the term Marne culture. 4 Morel 1898; Déchelette 1914; cf. Roualet 1978. 5 ‘…nemůže býti pochybnosti ostejném jejich původu apokrevném blízkém příbuzenství.’ 6 ‘…národa, který od Lužnice až za Loiru seděl avdobě Caesarově ještě značnou část Gallie zaujímal.’
12 STUDIA HERCYNIA XXVII/2 STRADONICE BEFORE PÍČ AND DÉCHELETTE The site called Hradiště (Figs. 3–6) is located about 30 km as the crow flies southwest of Prague on aprominent hill or rather amassive terrain block, rising 100 m above the right bank of the Berounka River between the villages of Stradonice and Nižbor.7 It became famous far beyond the borders of Bohemia by the hoard of Celtic gold coins ‑Regenbogenschüsselchen discovered in the summer of 1877 and the avalanche of archaeological finds brought to light by the subsequent ‘gold rush’. 7 For modern excavations cf. Rybová– Drda 1994; for overviews cf. Waldhauser 2001, 464–468; Čtveráketal. 2003, 293–298; for old excavations and finds cf. Sklenář 2011, 317–319; Sklenář 2015; Salač 2011, 464; Hlava 2012, 471–472; Valentová 2013. Fig. 3: Stradonice with the Hradiště (the peak on the right -hand side), view from the southeast (drawing by K. Liebscher in Jirásek ed. 1903). Fig. 4: The northern slopes of Hradiště (in the left -hand side of the picture), where the hoard of Celtic gold coins was found (drawing by K. Liebscher in Jirásek ed. 1903).
13KAREL SKLENÁŘ The name of this massif (in its Germanized form Hradischt) thus became widely known in the La Tène culture archaeology. However, even the literature concerning the relationship between Déchelette and Píč fails to mention that the Hradiště had been awell -known site long before that and the views on its interpretation that both the above -mentioned scholars later held had long been present in previous scholarship. Therefore, it is appropriate to briefly add ahistorical dimension to this picture. The place name Hradiště (in Czech ‘the place where the castle used to stand’, ‘the scanty remains of acastle’) is documented as early as 1538, but it is undoubtedly older and shows that the remains of prehistoric fortifications, surrounding the 90 ha large summit plateau, were already known at that time and were certainly more prominent than today. However, the site and its surroundings were better known for the relatively frequent finds of gold (Celtic) Fig. 5: Hradiště at Stradonice from the northeast in the 1970s(Photo by the author). Fig. 6: Hradiště at Stradonice– detail from the map of the Second Imperial military survey (mid-19th century).
14 STUDIA HERCYNIA XXVII/2 coins, especially the extraordinary hoard of at least 7,000 pieces from the nearby village of Podmokly (1771).8 It was in adiscussion about this find that N. A. Voigt (1771, 76), the founder of scientific numismatics in Bohemia, first mentioned the old masonry still visible at Hradiště. Among the archaeologists, Kalina von Jäthenstein (1836, 42) was the first to report on it, and from there the German literature took it up. The above -mentioned Professor Jan Erazim Vocel,9 was instrumental in the exploration of Hradiště. In 1851, as the first archaeologist to visit Hradiště, he carried out ashort (and unfortunately undocumented) survey of the still visible portions of the fortifications. Stradonice was thus included in the first printed archaeological map of Bohemia (Schmitt 1856). Shortly afterwards, the first documented excavations at Hradiště took place. In 1852 Karel Feistmantel (1819–1885), ageologist with an interest in archaeology, dug test trenches on the slopes of Hradiště and apparently came across asettlement layer or features (pits). Although nothing survived of his finds, their brief description makes their Late La Tène date evident. However, abundant archaeological finds (including many forgeries) suddenly appeared on the antiquarian market after ahoard of about 200 Celtic coins was discovered here in the summer of 1877. The subsequent ‘gold rush’ brought hundreds of treasure hunters here, who compensated for the scarcity of coin finds by selling ‘antiquities’ at prices accessible to private collectors and antiquarians rather than unwealthy museums. Most of the finds thus disappeared abroad, although aconsiderable part was also acquired by collectors in Bohemia (principally the collection of Emanuel Štěpán Berger, followed by those of W. Grosse, W. Osborne, N. Lehmann, etc.) and many of them eventually found their way to the National Museum in Prague. The largest collection was accumulated by Štěpán Berger (Fig. 7), but the most important professional interest was that of Ludvík Šnajdr (Fig. 8), who carried out surface surveys at Hradiště in 1879–1881 and made the first surviving plan of the site. 8 For an overview of the find circumstances with relevant bibliography and quotations from earlier publications cf. Sklenář 2011, 235–236. 9 For more detail on him cf. Sklenář 1981; Sklenář 2023b. Fig. 7: Emanuel Štěpán Berger. Fig. 8: Ludvík Šnajdr.
15KAREL SKLENÁŘ As far as the official archaeologists and institutions were concerned, the first to notice Hradiště was the Prehistoric Commission of the Imperial Academy of Sciences at Vienna. Its president, Professor Ferdinand von Hochstetter visited the site in August 1878. Although the commission included Stradonice among the first few sites to investigate in 1878, this exploration never took place, although the observations of the more expert visitors unanimously spoke of amassive and rich cultural layer. The Archaeological Committee of the National Museum in Prague had so limited financial means that they could never even think of such an undertaking. Instead, the surface of Hradiště was soon devastated by treasure and antiquity hunters to such an extent that it soon no longer appeared promising for excavation. In any case, thanks to these finds and their collectors, the archaeological and historical classification of the Stradonice Hradiště, which until then depended only on afew objects acquired by the National Museum and the finds of gold Regenbogenschüsselchen, started becoming clearer. It has become acommon practice in recent scholarship to simplify the issue of the Stradonice interpretation to the statement that Píč wrongly identified the site as the Marcomanni centre of Marobudum, whereas Déchelette established it as Celtic (Laténian). In principle this is true, but the development of the interpretation of the site was somewhat more complex, and neither of the scholars was the first to come up with his view. Already the earliest report on archaeological finds from Stradonice attributed Hradiště to the Marcomanni and considered the finds to be their loot from the Romans. It was written down by Count Eugen Černín of Chudenice in his diary in 1818 and was probably based on the information from his tutor, the ‘father of Czech prehistoric research’ Josef Dobrovský (Sklenář 2015, 41; Sklenář 2023a, 173). In particular, the discovery of the ‘Podmokly treasure’ naturally gave rise to the question of whether Stradonice could have been the hitherto unknown Marobudon/Marobudu(u)m, the seat of the Marcomanni ruler Maroboduus/Marbod, alluded to by Tacitus (Ann II, 62.3 without naming it) or Claudius Ptolemy (II, 11.14). Marobudum was of considerable importance for the earliest history of Bohemia, and from time immemorial, no other site recorded in Bohemia and its surroundings in the map of Claudius Ptolemy was being searched with such afervour. From the time of the Renaissance chronicles following Hájek of Libočany (1541, V–VIv), it was being located at the hillfort of Závist nad Vltavou immediately south of Prague (which ultimately turned out to be aCeltic oppidum). From the beginning of the 18th century, it was also identified directly with Prague and various other attempts appeared later. But already the eminent historian and numismatist of the Enlightenment period N. A. Voigt (1771, 76) was the first to declare, with reference to the discovery of the gold coins, that the ruins at the Stradonice Hradiště could be considered the remains of Maroboduus’ capital. This idea was considered by Antonín Jungmann (1824, 63–64), influenced by discussions about the finds of gold coins, which were attributed (among others) to the Boii and the Marcomanni. However, later and more critical historians left the question of the location of Marobudum undecided, beginning with the most prominent 19th century Czech historian, František Palacký, in his study of the Boii (Palacký 1833, 423) and later in the first volume of his History of the Czech Nation (Palacký 1836; 1848). The Marcomanni line of interpretation, although archaeologically documented only from the late 1870s(Voss 1878; Osborne 1880), is in fact older than the Celtic one. As amatter of fact, the Regenbogenschüsselchen coins were not recognized as Celtic for along time and opinions about them varied widely until Vocel proved by his analyses that the prehistoric gold coins found in Bohemia were Celtic (Wocel 1850).
22 STUDIA HERCYNIA XXVII/2 Fig. 13: Photograph of the model of Hradiště from Píč’sexhibition with captions added for the use in the publication. Déchelette described his impression of the Stradonice collection in the National Museum: ‘[…] la similitude des antiquités de Stradonice et de Bibracte m’avait très vivement frappé. J’avais éprouvé la surprise que M. Pič avait lui -même ressentie au musée de Saint -Germain devant les vitrines de Bibracte’ (Déchelette 1901a; Déchelette 1904, 183–184). From there, Déchelette went on to Vienna to see M. Hoernes and J. Szombathy with the intention of studying the collection of Stradonice finds there as well. Immediately after his return, in June 1899, he reported on them at the 66 th Congrès national de la Société française d’archéologie at Mâcon, comparing Stradonice and Mont Beuvray (Déchelette 1901a; 1904). In this small work, he gave an interpretation of the Czech word Hradiště, adescription of the site, information about the finds, and expressed the opinion that the oppidum was founded in the 1st century BC and disappeared at the very end of it, at the time of the arrival of the Marcomanni in Bohemia. He summarised his opinion in one sentence: ‘À travers le vaste territoire où rayonna la civilisation dite La Tène, […] on ne saurait trouver un autre exemple d’une analogie si complète entre les types industriels de deux villes gauloises’ (Déchelette 1901a; Déchelette 1904, 128). Incidentally, he was not the first to do so, although he probably did not know it: the similarity of the features and objects of Stradonice and Bibracte had already been stated by Šnajdr (1891, 67) and discussed by Hoernes (1892, 644). In 1899 Píč did not come to Mont Beuvray, although he had been invited (he was heading to Russia). He visited Roanne the following July (Pl. 1/1), on his next big western trip. He was
23KAREL SKLENÁŘ welcomed by Déchelette,22 and also advised by him as to the museums and collections to visit. He went to Reims and with Déchelette’sletter of introduction he studied the Léon Morel collection of Marne tombs, and to Paris with recommendations to meet Emile Cartailhac and Salomon Reinach. He was as fascinated by the similarity of the Bibracte finds, he could see in the museum at St. Germain, as Déchelette had been in Prague the year before; as he wrote alittle later, ‘the vessel sherds […] at Bibracte and at Stradonice are so identical that they must have been made in the same workshop, or by the same potter, and decorated with the same wavy combing’ (Píč 1908, 51). In 1901 he travelled again in France, but did not reach the surroundings of Bibracte; he probably stopped there in 1902, the last time he was in France as an archaeologist.23 He and Déchelette also had travel plans in common at the time: to go to England in 1901 (Píč proposed to meet him in Calais on 1 st July 24 but then he went there alone), and to Russia with (or in order to meet there) their mutual friend, Baron de Baye, who had been practically at home in the country as an archaeologist and ethnographer since 1895 (he was looking for the origin of the Celts there). However, neither of these plans was realised.25 Baron Joseph de Baye (1853–1931)26 (Fig. 14) was another French archaeologist who maintained alively correspondence with Píč. He was very interested in Czech finds of the ‘Merovingian type’ from the Migration period, which he found to his surprise in the National Museum when he came here at Christmas 1893 to study Slavic archaeology. He published 22 ‘[…] en votre honneur je ferai déblayer avant votre arrivée une petite longueur du rempart et une maison.’ (letter from Déchelette to Píč, Roanne 12th June 1900; National Museum Prague, Archive, Collection J. L. Píč; Binétruy 2000b, 149). 23 By 1911, when he went to Paris on paleographic business shortly before his death, both Stradonice and Bibracte were beyond the horizon of his interest. 24 Letter concept from Píč to Déchelette, Prague 23rd January 1901 (National Museum Prague, Archive, Collection J. L. Píč). 25 The numerous letters of Baron de Baye to Píč from the years 1893–1911 (National Museum Prague, Archive, Collection J. L. Píč, box 3, no. 102) do not refer to the Russia travel plan. 26 Vatan 2004, 26–27, 65–66. Fig. 14: Baron Joseph de Baye.
24 STUDIA HERCYNIA XXVII/2 apamphlet about them,27 looking for their affinity with the western finds attributed to the Franks, and judged that similar finds in Bohemia originated in acolony of Frankish traders who had come to Bohemia– perhaps directly as the retinue of the ruler of the Slavic tribes, Samo, who, according to the chronicler Fredegarius, was originally aFrankish merchant. Píč doubted this interpretation in his brief review of this work (Píč 1893–95), even so, de Baye was elected amember of the Archaeological Committee of Bohemia on his recommendation. However, he did not maintain his interest in finds from Bohemia and settled permanently in Russia immediately afterwards. He barely survived the revolutionary years and returned home, poor and ill, for the rest of his life. It is agreat pity that Píč did not leave any detailed testimony about his trips to France, not even any handwritten notes in his notebooks of the relevant years. It is the more so unfortunate that anumber of travelogue feuilletons are preserved among his manuscripts and are amost interesting offshoot of his literary output. Most of them recount stories and observations from his travels to the East, from Slovakia through the Balkans to Constantinople, anumber of them concern journeys to Russia, close to his heart, but none of them comes from the West with the exception of Germany and Italy. This extensive collection is by no means complete28– perhaps Píč would have continued his narratives had he been given more time. 27 de Baye 1894; cf. Šnajdr 1903. 28 Two volumes of feuilletons on travels motived by European archaeology and history were edited and published by the present author (Píč 2004; 2017). Fig. 15: Le Hradischt de Stradonic (Déchelette 1901a).
25KAREL SKLENÁŘ STRADONICE IN THE PUBLICATIONS OF BOTH FRIENDS While Déchelette promptly published the first information about Stradonice for the international specialists in alanguage other than German and included it among the counterparts of his Bibracte (Fig. 15),29 Píč wrote athorough monograph of this extraordinary site and published it in 1903 as the fourth volume of his Antiquities (Píč 1903). Here, for the first time, he provided not only acomprehensive overview of the entire find assemblage, created by so various ways and means, but also apicture of what he termed the ‘late Gallic culture’. Píč was, of course, not the first to write about Stradonice (neither was Déchelette for that matter). However, the previous publications were almost always only partial and brief notes in newspapers and magazines– with the exception of Wilhelm Osborne, the archaeologist and collector, who lived in Prague at the times of the Stradonice ‘gold rush’ (Osborne 1878; 1880; 1883). The National Museum had already taken up the idea of alarger publication in 1878 at Berger’sinstigation, but this never happened. Areal material publication and overall assessment was still lacking– researchers were discouraged by the enormous number and variety of finds, the fact that they were scattered in various locations, and the complex problems of interpretation. Píč drew both on the collection of the National Museum and on large private collections (especially Berger’s, which the museum had acquired at the turn of the century), and on the study of the vast literature of comparative material in French and German museums. He produced awork that– archaeologically, factually, and methodologically– was idolized by his admirers and respected by his opponents. The problem was, however, that the work was published in Czech without foreign language apparatus (this was not the custom at the time). Scholars from abroad– as evidenced by Píč’sextensive correspondence– highly appreciated the above -average richness of the illustration (apart of which were, moreover, exceptionally in colour 30 ), but the text remained inaccessible to them. Some advised him to make aGerman translation as soon as possible (J. Szombathy31) or to provide at least asummary (J. Naue) or to translate the figure captions (J. Mestorf). An exception among them was Déchelette who was particularly linguistically gifted and mastered several languages. Having noticed anumber of parallels with French material in the Bohemian collections not only in the La Tène period but also in earlier epochs he understood the importance of Bohemia for the archaeology of Europe: ‘Grâce à sa situation géographique, la Bohême, placée au centre de l’Europe, fut de tout temps penétrée profondément par les éléments étrangers, partis souvent de directions opposées. Aussi l’étude de ses antiquités présente -t -elle un intérêt tout particulier’ (Déchelette 1901a; Déchelette 1904, 185). While others complained about the incomprehensibility of the text of Píč’sAntiquities, Déchelette was able to cope with this obstacle.32 Already in the autumn of 1899, after his re29 Déchelete 1902; On his relation to Stradonice cf: Pierrevelcin 2014. 30 Well before the publication of the French translation (12th May 1905) Déchelette informed Píč that illustrations of the volume that he presented at the French archaeological congress at Périgueux, aroused great admiration. 31 ‘Was wäre das erst für ein Bombenerfolg durch ganz Europa, wenn Sie ihrer Gelehrsamkeit nicht die enge Rinne der čechischen Sprache geben müßten’– aletter from the 13 th January 1902 (National Museum Prague, Archive, collection J. L. Píč, box 11, no. 878). 32 Déchelette to Vincent Durand in June 1899 about understanding Czech: ‘Ces bohémiens s’obstinent à ne pas écrire en allemand, il me faut prendre conaissance des travaux écrits en langue tchèque’(Binétruy 2000b, 142). In letters to Píč he wrote enthusiastically: ‘En ce moment je travaille à l’étude de la langue tchéque, que je trouve très intéressante’ (Roanne, 3rd October 1899); ‘Je ne suis
26 STUDIA HERCYNIA XXVII/2 Fig. 16: Píč’sbook in Déchelette’stranslation (Píč 1906).
27KAREL SKLENÁŘ turn from Stradonice, he began to learn Czech, with the intention of translating Píč’sbook as soon as it was published (although he had some difficulty doing so because he could not find agrammar book or alarge dictionary).33 His efforts to get acquainted with such aremote area must have seemed strange to many French.34 In any case he acquired at least apassive knowledge of Czech remarkably quickly, so that he was soon able to translate selected parts of Píč’sbook into French. He worked on its translation immediately upon its publication in 1903. In aletter to Salomon Reinach (17th March 1903), he justified his plan on the grounds that no one in Germany or England reads Czech and therefore there would certainly be interest in aFrench edition (Péré -Noguès 2020, 62). The translation into French (Píč 1906) (Fig. 16) was somewhat surprisingly published in Germany. It was so because Parisian publishers were not interested in archaeology, much less in Bohemia, and Prague printers did not have enough French typefaces. Déchelette therefore proposed ajoint edition, 35 but at the beginning of 1904 he managed to arrange for publication by the renowned Karl W. Hiersemann publishing house in Leipzig. Píč received finished copies in February 1906. It was the first Czech archaeological publication translated abroad in 30 years since Vocel’sPrehistory of Bohemia (that is of its second half, devoted to the Slavs). It was, however, not aliteral translation– Déchelette omitted some passages, while others were modified in accordance with his different opinion. As amatter of fact, when it came to the interpretation of Stradonice as awhole, the opinions of the two friends, hitherto in concordance on technical aspects, were at odds. Still, their disagreement remained very subtle and polite without any bitterness– unlike the polemics conducted between the two hostile camps in Czech archaeology. ‘CZECH BIBRACTE’ OR MAROBUDUM? THE DISPUTE OVER THE INTERPRETATI‑ ON OF STRADONICE It was evident already from the chapter on Stradonice before Píč that from the very beginning of the site’sexploration two interpretations clashed: on the one hand a‘Boian city’ of unknown name, on the other hand Marobudum (or Marobudum, Marobudon of Claudius Ptolemy), i.e. actually a‘Germanic town’– in contrast to Tacitus’ widely quoted statement about the absence of towns among the Germans. However, only Píč had to come to terms with this tradition, since Déchelette was not burdened by the development of these controversies and approached Stradonice on the basis of his knowledge of the French oppida. Given the parallels mentioned between Stradonice and Bibracte, he had no doubt that Stradonice belonged to the same era and cultural milieu (his ‘civilisation des oppida’), almost as a‘succursal pas encore bien fort en tchéque, mais je commence à lire et dans peu de mois je lirai couramment’ (Roanne, 24th October 1900) (National Museum Prague, Archive, collection J. L. Píč). 33 At the same time, however, he tried to obtain the translation of another work by Píč as testified by an interesting side -story: Karel Kučera, aCzech employee of the Austro -Hungarian Bank in Vienna, asked Píč in aletter from the 11th June 1900 to lend him apublication of his (Píč 1897) because Déchelette had asked him amonth before to make atranslation for him of its Chapter called History and Archaeology. Amonth later Kučera sent the text back to Píč (National Museum Prague, Archive, collection J. L. Píč, box 8, no. 530). We have no clue as to how Déchelette happened to know Kučera and why he asked him and not directly Píč. 34 J.-G. Bulliot wrote to Déchelette on the 17th May 1899: ‘Mais n’est -il pas étrange, que l’explorateur de Bibracte aille échouer en Bohême pour y retrouver des ancêtres inconnus’ (Péré -Noguès 2020, 62). 35 Aletter from Roanne 20th May 1903– National Museum Prague, Archive, collection J. L. Píč.
28 STUDIA HERCYNIA XXVII/2 of Bibracte’, and attributed this fact to the direct trade links between France and central Europe via the upper Danube and Rhine regions. He joined his 1900 article on Stradonice as an appendix to his report on the excavations at Mont Beuvray in 1897–1901 (Déchelette 1904, 127–188, tab.XXIII–VI), and even inserted achapter on Stradonice to Volume IV of his Manuel, devoted to the Late Iron Age (Déchelette 1914, 487–491) as acounterpart to his description of the French oppida and their material culture (on Bibracte Déchelette 1914, 454–463). He was not alone in this interpretation: for example, Camille Jullian in 1906 described Stradonice as a‘ville industrielle’ and probably the main seat of the Boii (Jullian 1906; cf. Déchelette 1914; Déchelette 1927, 487). For Píč, the similarity with the French oppida was also clear (‘The Stradonice settlement […] is almost atransplanted piece of Bibracte or Alesia’36– Píč 1897, 532), but he faced adifferent problem. As he attributed the ‘Marnian culture’ to the Celts -Boii and the Roman Iron Age population of Bohemia to the Slavs (which was his unfortunate ethnohistorical construction), he had nothing within Czech archaeology to connect with the Germanic Marcomanni, who according to historical accounts appeared at the turn of the eras under Marobuduus. The extraordinary nature of Stradonice, which also contained an obvious Roman component, seemed to coincide well with the brief Marcomannic occupation, and Píč decided to link them. In that case, however, the direct parallel with the French oppida needed to be scaled down. This gave rise to problems which would otherwise have been avoided. The dating he proposed did match the historical dates of the arrival of the Marcomanni from the west to Bohemia, and the aforementioned lack of similar finds between France and Bohemia led him to hypothesize that cultural elements identical to the French oppida were brought here by the Marcomanni from their original homeland west of the Rhine, or by Gaulish artisans arriving with them. In this way, he could explain Stradonice as aforeign, short -lived, and isolated phenomenon, ending with the departure of Marobuduus’ retinue from Bohemia. Moreover, in this way he could revive an attractive conjecture, traditional since the 18th century– the identification of Stradonice as the seat of Marobuduus. The idea did not occur only to him at that point. Even though at the beginning of his archaeological career, he did not consider amore precise localization of Marobudum possible, he soon– first cautiously (Píč 1890–92, 438; Píč 1893, LV), and later as an almost absolute certainty (Píč 1897, 533)– expressed his support for its localization at Stradonice. Apart from the archaeological grounds he argued that the fortification of Hradiště is extraordinary and differs in its character from other fortifications in Bohemia. Píč summarized his interpretation of the Hradiště in asingle sentence at the end of his work (Píč 1902, 143–144): ‘The archaeological evidence therefore shows that the Marobudum of historical reports […] can only be placed on the Hradiště near Stradonice […]; in the fortified military camp at the Hradiště lay the power of Marobud, which came to its end after the town was overthrown.’ He had anumber of good arguments for his interpretation at the time, and therefore it did not arouse any significant reaction, not even among his sworn opponents from the so -called ‘university school’. Both sides agreed that Stradonice was an alien, external, and isolated phenomenon in the prehistory of Bohemia. But one who did not agree with Píč’sinterpretation was Déchelette as Píč’sopponents in Bohemia did not fail to point out with satisfaction.37 He had previously completely agreed with Píč’sopinion, based mainly on the collections of French museums, that the inhumation graves 36 ‘Stradonické hradiště […] je takřka kus přeneseného Bibracte nebo Alesie.’ 37 In Bohemia the principal criticism appeared in Šnajdr 1904.
29KAREL SKLENÁŘ in northern and central Bohemia– appearing suddenly without any local antecedent and with furnishings quite corresponding to those in the Marne and middle Seine basins– belonged to the same Marne culture and specifically to the Celtic Boii, coming from France.38 Their views on the close archaeological affinity between Stradonice and Bibracte also coincided, although Déchelette’sidea of the reason for this changed over time: he initially agreed with Píč’sidea of a‘colony’ of Haedui -Boii craftsmen among the Marcomanni, but later rejected migrations and favoured the explanation of trade between Stradonice and France within the sphere of Celtic civilization.39 However, as soon as he became acquainted with Píč’shypothesis about Marobudum, he objected to it. 40 Already when he sent his 1900 brochure to Píč, he accompanied it with afriendly criticism: ‘Je prends la liberté dans cet opuscule de vous présenter quelques objections en ce qui concerne la date de la destruction de Hradischt et son attribution aux Marcomans. Je vous avoue que maintenant, je suis fortement tenté de faire de Stradonic un oppidum boïen, détruit à l’arrivée de Marbod. Je suis surtout frappé de l’absence de monnaies romaines imperiales et aussi de ce que les fibules en bronze les plus récentes ou les plus communes de Bibracte et d’Alésia ne figurent pas à Stradonic. Pourtant, si le Hradischt aété occupé de l’an 12 à l’an 19ap. J. C., l’occupation serait postérieure à celle de Bibracte, abandonée vers l’an 9 avant J. C.’41 In the work he sent to Píč he justified his dating of the demise of Stradonice to the time of the Marcomanni arrival (which clearly ruled out the identification with Marobudum) in even more detail (Déchelette 1901a; Déchelette 1904, 186–187). Píč contradicted him and other proponents of the Boii oppidum hypothesis (he did not use the term ‘oppidum’ himself) by saying that: their opinion corresponded to Celtic archaeology in France, but not in Bohemia (no other Celtic oppidum was known between France and Stradonice at that time); that the Celts in Bohemia did not have oppida; 42 and that the Boii no longer dwelled in Bohemia at the time of the beginning of the settlement of Hradiště;43 moreover, the Boii buried unburnt bodies, whereas the slight traces of burials at Hradiště were cremations; and finally, Stradonice lies outside the area of distribution of the Laténian (= ‘Boian’) inhumation graves. He summarised his arguments in aletter to Déchelette dated 21st December 1900:44 ‘Votre avis, que Stradonice étaient un oppidum Boien, on peut vraiment appliquer: si le mont Beuvrai est un oppidum Aeduorum, le mont Gergovie un oppidum Arvernorum, on pourrait par analogie dire, que Stradonice est un oppidum Boiorum. Cette conclusion serait 38 Píč 1902, 158–159; Déchelette 1914, 584–586. 39 Déchelette 1901a; Déchelette 1904, 184–185; cf. Roure– Kaenel 2019. 40 On this controversy cf. mainly Pierrevelcin 2012, 43–46. 41 Letter from Roanne 13th October 1900 (National Museum Prague, Archive, collection J. L. Píč). Déchelette apologised again in his letter from the 9 th January 1902, regretting the difference of opinions expressed in his work on the matter of the oppidum’sinhabitants but stressing the difficulty of ethnic issues. 42 It is worth mentioning that already in 1845 J. E. Vocel was of the opinion that one of the Bohemian hillforts (Češov in northeastern Bohemia) resembled the French oppida in its size and massiveness, and in 1851 he presumed the same for the hillfort Vladař in western Bohemia (Wocel 1845, 20; Wocel 1851, no. 100). Late Iron Age finds have actually been discovered at Češov (though it is apparently not an oppidum), whereas at Vladař Late Iron Age occupation has not been attested convincingly down to our day. 43 Déchelette on the contrary admitted that remains of the Boii may have remained in Bohemia by the time of Marobuduus’ conquest in 12–10 BC (Déchelette 1901a; Déchelette 1904, 176–177). 44 Letter draft, National Museum Prague, Archive, collection J. L. Píč.
30 STUDIA HERCYNIA XXVII/2 très jolie, mais il y aun petit obstacle: les Boii en quittant la Bohème sont venus en Gaule 58 av. notre air et Marobud avec les Marcomans est venu en Bohême 12–9 av. Chr., c’est à dire, il y aune différence de 50 années entre le depart des Boïens et l’arrivie de Marobud. Après: les Boii sont representés en archéologie par Latène I, dans une grande partie de Bohême, la culture de Stradonice, apportée du Mont Beuvrai se trouve seulement à Stradonice: les Boii étaient un peuple dominant en Bohême, Stradonice sont une épisode archéologique aun temps, ou les Boii étaient dejà disparu.’ (The manuscript is reproduced precisely including the original grammar errors, only the accents were added). Píč tried to downplay the striking parallels with Bibracte by suggesting that the La Tène component of the finds is due to artisans coming from Bibracte, who then worked (together with others who, according to Tacitus, came from Roman provincial towns) for Marobuduus’ court and his warriors, not for commerce outside of Stradonice where there is no trace of their products. Regarding chronology, Píč stated that the find assemblage contained objects from the horizon of the ‘Marne or Duchcov/Dux type’ brooches to the beginning of the Roman Imperial period. Drawing on recent excavations of Bibracte and especially on the chronology of the La Tène and Roman brooches valid at the time, he reckoned that the earliest elements were accidental and that the beginning of the hillfort can be placed sometime before 15–10 BC (‘the objects of the Stradonice hillfort begin where Bibracte ends and Augustodunum and other Roman colonies of the Augustan period begin’), whereas its end dated before AD 25–50. Given the methodological level of the period, we should not be surprised that Píč and others did not take into account that all the finds from Stradonice came from asecond or third hand, were either found accidentally or excavated quite unprofessionally without provenance information, and that it is not even guaranteed that all the pieces actually come directly from the Hradiště. 45 As amatter of fact, one could not even rule out an origin from acompletely different place, given that the designation ‘Stradonice’ soon became asought -after brand in the antiquities trade. Déchelette, in the preface to his translation (Píč 1906, iii–iv), summarised Píč’sinterpretation as follows: ‘résidence royale de Marobod, […] mais profondément pénétrée par la civilisation celtique’, but against this he clearly referred to his previous works on Stradonice as ‘un oppidum boïen, fondé dans le cours du premier siècle et détruit sans doute à l’arrivée de Marobod, vers l’an 10 av. J .-C.’ And it was probably mainly due to his decisive position that the Marcomannian hypothesis fell out of discussion soon after Píč’sdeath. The last time the potential location of Marobudum at Hradiště was considered was in the 1930sby Anton Gnirs, aGerman archaeologist in Bohemia (cf. Gnirs 1976). The question of the location of Marobudum has not been resolved to this day. Leaving aside the possibility that it is actually not aspecific toponym, but only ageneric description of Marobuduus’ whereabout, mistakenly considered to be aplace name already in antiquity, the place can be looked for in Bohemia. However, the modern idea of Marobudum is that of asignificant settlement and production concentration from the beginning of the earlier Roman Iron Age period rather than atown.46 45 In 1958 asettlement dated to the recent and late La Tène period (2nd–1st century BC) but mainly to the Early Roman Iron Age (1 st –2 nd century AD) was excavated at the foothill of Hradiště (Motyková- -Šneidrová 1962; cf. Waldhauser 2001, 466; Droberjar 2002, 314). This should be taken into account when considering the (insignificant) Roman Iron Age component which played such an important role in dating the end of occupation and in associating the site with Marobuduus. 46 On the Marobudum issue in detail cf. Dobiáš 1964, 105, 143–144; more recently Waldhauser 2001, 16–17; Droberjar 2000, 56–60; Droberjar 2002, 172; Salač ed. 2008, 125.
31KAREL SKLENÁŘ CONCLUSION AND LEGACY The difference of opinion on the dating and interpretation of Stradonice did not harm the friendly relationship between the two scholars. They remained in correspondence throughout the following years of their lives. Déchelette facilitated further contacts for Píč (e.g. with prof.Henri Breuil, who was interested in another of Píč’svolumes), and at Píč’ssuggestion (24th November 1900) Déchelette and Cartailhac were elected corresponding members of the Archaeological Committee of the Museum of the Kingdom of Bohemia in Prague (Fig. 17).47 It was Déchelette’sfirst foreign membership of this kind. Unfortunately, only afew years were left to both of them, and without knowing it, both died similar deaths, though for different reasons. 47 National Museum Prague, Archive, collection Archeologický sbor, box 2, no. 138; adraft of aletter from Píč to Déchelette, Prague 21st December 1900 (National Museum Prague, Archive, collection J. L. Píč, box 4, no. 195). Fig. 17: J. L. Píč’sproposal on electing E. Cartailhac and J. Déchelette members of the Archaeological Committee.