A cattle mandible thong-smoother from a grave: Strap production and cattle traction in the Late Copper Age in Hungary

Abstract

A recently found cattle-based mandibular thong-smoother, which was the only bone tool in the Baden culture burial of a 6–10-year-old child at the site of Balatonlelle-Rádpuszta-Romtemplom mellett (western Hungary), represents the best-preserved Eneolithic implement in this category ever published in Hungary. Being one of the oldest specimens from the distribution area of mandibular thong-smoothers, it brings new information regarding the origin and possible use of this rarely identified type of tool linked to strap and thong-making in the period from the Eneolithic to the Middle Bronze Age. Having been recovered from the grave of a child, it draws attention to the possibility that children may have been involved in strap production. The evaluation of analogies from and outside of Hungary also offered a complex review of mandibular thong-smoothers. In addition to the role of these implements in taming and driving horses already discussed in the specialist literature, we also point to their involvement in the use of harnessed cattle for draught and transport, and its linkage to the spread of wagon and carriage in the wake of the 4th millennium.