Rethinking the Late Iron Age Dacians - Alin Hent

A Historiographical and Archaeological Perspective on Status Identities

This work is built upon my doctoral dissertation, titled Aristocraţia dacică (sec. I. a. Chr. – sec I. p. Chr.). O perspectivă arheologică asupra statutului social / The Dacian Aristocracy (1st century BC – 1st century AD). An Archaeological Perspective on Social Status1, which I successfully defended at the Babeş-Bolyai University from Cluj-Napoca, Romania, on February 22, 2019. While this work retains the core tenets of the 2019 version, it presents a revised and enhanced exploration of the subject matter through the omission of some elements and the significant refinement of others.
My research on this topic, initiated in 2014, commenced from two ideas expressed in the Romanian archaeological and historical literature. The first idea was expressed by Professor Al. Vulpe in a study, or more precisely, a critical analysis of our current knowledge regarding the Dacian communities (‘Geto-Dacian’ in his own words), from the first century BCE to the first century CE2. In this paper, Vulpe highlighted a crucial aspect: despite the large amount of written material on this topic, substantial gaps in our understanding persist. These lacunae are often filled with hypotheses, frequently burdened by historical biases. Moreover, Vulpe argued that these biases stem from the fragmentary nature of the ancient (and early medieval) written sources available, which are susceptible to speculative interpretations. (INTRODUCTION)

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