Preliminary Data Regarding the Archaeological Research Performed between 2016 and 2019 at the Cistercian Abbey in Igriș/Egres, Timiș County
Preliminary Data Regarding the Archaeological Research Performed between 2016 and 2019 at the Cistercian Abbey in Igriș/Egres, Timiș County

Summary/Abstract: In 2016 started the archaeological research at one of the most important monastic foundations in the Medieval Kingdom of Hungary, the Cistercian abbey in Igriș/Egres, Timiș County. The main goals of the research were identifying the abbey church, establishing the general stratigraphy of the site, and discovering the location of the royal tombs.King Andrew II, who reigned between 1205 and 1235, was the abbey’s greatest benefactor. According tothe written sources, queen Yolanda of Courtenay was buried in Egres abbey in 1233 and king Andrew II in 1235.In the western foreground of the church abbey crossing the robust foundation of two pillars of the nave were excavated. Both the northern and the southern pillar base had a rectangular brick structure attached to it from the direction of the centre of the nave. These structures are the foundation of a tumbas construction. The southern one (discovered in 2016) must have been the burial site of queen Yolanda and Andrew II was buried in the superstructure of the northern tumba (discovered in 2019). In 2016 and 2017 was excavated a “mass grave” that contained numerous human skeletons, fragmentarily preserved, mixed with various objects including coins that can be dated to the twelfth-thirteenth centuries. All of these artifacts, deposited on top of each other, indicate an attempt to remove the remains of a disaster that had struck the abbey. The violent event that triggered this deposition was most likely the 1241 Mongol invasion that also affected the abbey of Egres, as attested by the written sources.A remarkable result of the excavations performed in 2019 was the discovery of the traces of a church that was older than the church of the monastery founded in 1179. The excavation revealed a church with a rectangular nave provided with a small niche on the northern side and the nave ending in a semicircular apse to the east. Burials were performed inside and outside the older church during its period of use, as indicated by the discovery of brick cist-graves. This older church can be likely dated to the eleventh century and was probably a parish church that served several villages.

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