BURIAL SITES IN ZÁHORIE (MIDDLE AND LOWER MORAVA REGION) IN ROMAN TIMES AND IN THE EARLY MIDDLE AGES. CONSIDERING THE CAUSES OF FORMAL AND SPATIAL DYNAMICS OF THE BURIAL RITE – ETHNICITY, RELIGION OR SOCIO-ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT?

In this paper, the authors are considering the causes of changes in the burial rite in the middle and lower Morava River region in the first millennium AD. Their considerations are based on the fact that the settlement activities of several ´ethnic´ groups are documented in the studied area during the first millennium AD. The authors discuss important phenomena associated with the burial rite of Germans and Slavs, such as the change from cremation to inhumation, coexistence or continuity of these rites or continuity or discontinuity of burial sites during the first millennium AD in Záhorie. The authors conclude that the primary determinant of changes in the burial rite was ethnicity, but in synergy with religion and socio-economic development.