Abstract:
The research of the medieval settlement area of Cluj/Kolozsvár/Klausenburg has been one of the most neglected fields by archaeology since the first finds excavated in 1896, which can be traced back to various reasons. The 29 or 30 traces indicating archaeological sites are the most we know of Cluj.
The most important eleventh century archaeological finds are the fortress made of wood and soil and the sites found in inside it in Mãnãştur/Monostor. Although most pit dwellings excavated in the area of the fortress have been dated to the eleventh century, the excavating archaeologists dated them to the turn of the ninth–tenth centuries. It must be stated here that most finds excavated in them can firmly be dated to the different eras of the eleventh century. The finds from the ninth–tenth centuries make up an insignificant part of the whole. Therefore the fortress cannot be dated to the ninth–tenth centuries but to the beginning of the eleventh century the earliest. Despite the neglected state of research, the settlement remains and stray finds around the fortress and to the west, south-east and south of it, and the finds collected during the field researches all seem to support that there must have been a dense network of settlements. The signs of a similar settlement network can be seen 2 km away, where the finds, which can be dated to the eleventh–twelfth centuries may indicate the smaller or bigger settlement sections constituting the old Cluj.
