ArcheoBudaPest 2020/09

Keywords: Roman Age, Middle Ages, Modern Period, stratigrahical material

On August 26, 2020, the Budapest History Museum conducted an archaeological monitoring at the site of the Buda Hospital of the Order of Mercy (BIK), Building 1, located at 15–17 Frankel Leó Road, Lipthay Street, and Germanus Gyula Park in District II. The monitoring accompanied mechanical excavation work, supplemented by manual labor, as part of connecting the hospital building to the electrical grid. Prior to this, on August 24, 2020, I observed an open utility trench along the route of the removed bicycle path in Germanus Gyula Park. This trench ended at the eastern edge of Lipthay Street, where an excavation pit had been formed in the western traffic lane. I documented this with photos and informed the Excavation Project Office that utility trenching had previously taken place in this area without archaeological supervision.

After the work was commissioned, archaeological monitoring followed the excavation on August 26. On this day, near the southeast corner on the eastern side of Building 1, mechanical excavation was carried out over an area of approximately 1–1.5×3 meters to a depth of 2.25 meters in loose, humus-sandy light brown backfill, heavily mixed with modern construction debris.

Further east, in a previously created pit in the western lane of Lipthay Street (approx. 1.5×5 meters and 2.1 meters deep), excavation continued to a depth of 2.25 meters. Here as well, mixed modern and more recent backfill was observed. In the spoil, I noted a carved limestone block about 60 cm long and 20×20 cm in cross-section, which I had the workers set aside. This carved stone, likely part of a door or window frame, cannot be precisely dated but likely originates between the medieval and modern periods.

East of the road, the trench route crossed the park area in an east–west direction. This section was about 40–50 cm wide and 70 cm deep, also cut through modern and more recent backfill. From the spoil, I collected ceramic fragments from the Roman, medieval, and modern periods, as well as animal bones and iron pieces. The trench was extended south-eastward at its eastern end, nearly reaching the road.

Historically, the Danube’s riverbank lay further west, within the hospital property’s courtyard. The cable route therefore ran across an area that was artificially filled in the 19th century. However, archaeological excavations along the former riverside have uncovered 1st-century Celtic features, Roman and medieval stone structures, a medieval road, silty and fill layers, and the stone and brick walls of the hospital from the modern and later periods (Bencze et al. 2020).

Contributor: Mónika Kurunczi (archaeologist)

Mónika Kurunczi