In this study, we summarise the preliminary results of thirty years of investigations at the Polgár-Bosnyákdomb site. The significance of the site located on the one-time bank of the Tisza River is that it lies no more than 5 km away from the well-known Polgár-Csőszhalom settlement complex. One of our goals was to investigate the relation between the settlements in the Polgár Island micro-region and to identify the similarities and differences between them. It is quite obvious that with its estimated 70 hectares large extent, Polgár-Csőszhalom was a dominant settlement complex in this landscape during the earlier fifth millennium, while the Bosnyákdomb settlement, represented an entirely different scale with its 8 hectares and had a different role during this period. The AMS dates provide convincing evidence that the two settlements had been occupied simultaneously during one period of their lives. Despite their spatial proximity and chronological contemporaneity, the two settlements had a differing structural layout. Although both had a prominent stratified settlement mound that was separated from the single-layer settlement part by a ditch, the system of the ditches, their structure and, presumably, their social use differed substantially. This would suggest that each community  constructed its settlement and architectural structures according to different spatial rules in the different locations of Polgár Island. Despite the spatial differences, we could identify traces of similar community events on the settlement mounds at Bosnyákdomb and Csőszhalom such as the recurring practice of house burning.  Despite the smaller excavated areas, we identified wholly different mortuary practices at Bosnyákdomb, diverging fundamentally from the funerary rites practiced at Csőszhalom. The bones of the deceased were secondarily deposited into the ditch of the central mound. The various cultural features discussed in the above indicate that the community responses of the groups settling and living in the Polgár area during the Late Neolithic to the environmental challenges of the land around them were embodied by a set of distinctive cultural behaviours. Nevertheless, certain elements in the colourful diversity of material features and their different levels outline the structure of a micro-regional network with Csőszhalom in its centre in the Upper Tisza region.

The site of Polgár 31 (Ferenci-hát) is situated on the left bank of the Upper Tisza, within the so-called “Polgár Island”. The site consists of single features dated at the Alföld Linear Pottery Culture (ALP) I-III, while the majority of features belong to the youngest phase (ALP IV) attached to the Bükk Culture.

Our analysis focuses on both the chipped stone and the ground stone implements. The most important raw material used for the chipped stone industry of ALP IV phase was obsidian, followed by limno-hydroquartzites. Extra local raw materials played a minor role. Both in the case of obsidian as well as limnohydroquartzites on-site production was limited, while most artefacts were produced off-site. The structure of retouched tools shows that end-scrapers dominate slightly over marginally retouched blades.

The most commonly exploited raw material in the ground stone industry were various types of rhyolites deriving from the areas 40 to 50 km north of the site. Among tools predominate implements related to food preparation such as a variety of grinding stones, pestles, grinders etc. As part of rituals these tools were destroyed. Sometimes the fragments were used for crushing mineral dyes. Both: fragments of ground stone as well as chipped stone tools occur also in the graves.

“Polgár Island” is a natural elevation delimited by river banks; its flat area covers 70 sq.km The “Polgár Island” is of particular importance for the study of interregional contacts as raw materials deposits are absent in this territory. The settlement in the “Polgár Island” can be seen from the Middle Neolithic to the Early Copper Age (ALP I-IV, Late Neolithic and Tiszpolgár Culture). In this time-span changes in raw material supply, technology and organization of lithic production took place. In the Early Phase obsidian played the most important role, and contacts developed along the north-south axis. In the Late Neolithic horizon (Polgár-Csöszhálom-dűlő) the flow of obsidian was smaller, replaced by limnoquartzites. A major change in the systems of raw material supply occured at the beginning of the Copper Age, Simultaneously with changes in the direction of raw material supply, diachronic changes took place in the organization of lithic production.

Charred plant remains were recovered at the Polgár-Bosnyákdomb site dated to the Middle Neolithic period (the Tisza–Herpály–Csőszhalom culture), corresponding to the first half of the Vth millenium BC. Among cultivated plants found as dispersed within the archaeological features and in daub pieces, remains of emmer wheat Triticum dicoccon were the most frequent. Also, leguminous plants were used as demonstrated by seeds of lentil Lens culinaris. Among wild herbaceous plants, taxa of field and ruderal habitats prevailed (Chenopodium type album, Galium spurium, Polygnum mite and Bromus sp.) as well as those coming from dry grasslands (Stipa sp.). The analysis of charcoal remains showed that mostly wood belonging to Quercus sp., Ulmus sp. and Cornus sp. were collected as firewood from the proximity of the settlement, mainly from oak-dominated wooded steppes developed on the elevated surfaces and floodplain forests from the seasonally flooded alluvium. The most frequently found plant remains (Cornus sp. wood and Stipa sp. awns) were dated with the means of radiocarbon analysis and the chronology showed their use at the end of the settlement, toward the middle of the Vth millenium BC.