Threads Leads to the East A Major Spreading Area of the Perforated Cylindrical Bone Tubes from the 12th-13th Century (Orosháza, Békés County, Hungary)

Based on the overview of hungarian and international literature, the following picture emerges regarding the function of the bone tubes from Orosháza. Among the bird bone artifacts featuring one to three central openings, scholarly classifications suggest they could have functioned as thread guides, whistles or needle cases. They are considered needle cases if they have one or two circular perforations. However, this type of accessory is characteristic of an earlier horizon, specifically the 10th century. From the 11th century onward, a new variant featuring a pair of circular perforations on opposite sides of one end became widespread, including in regions where yurks were known, making it possible to clearly distinguish between the two differently used artifact types. For specimens with three openings arranged directly next to each other and perpendicular to the object’s longitudinal axes, the whistle function is questionable. Furthermore, they are unlikely to be needle cases, as more than two perforations in the central section would not have been necessary for attachment. In relation to the bone tubes from Orosháza, we lean toward the „yurok” (thread guide) function, a term frequently appearing in Russian and Ukrainian literature. At the beginning of our research, the analysis of scattered data suggests that yurks were present in the East-Central European region during the 11th-13th centuries, and in their area of origin, they can be documented even in later periods. Their use in the Carpathian Basin, based on the available data, is known from the 11th to the 13th centuries. After the Mongol invasion (1241-1242), they disappeared from archaeological findings, though simpler versions persisted in ethnographic records until the early 20th century.