jointly invaded the Pontic steppes and defeated the Magyars, forcing them to move to the Carpathian Basin in search for a new homeland. Their conquest of the Carpathian Basin is the principal subject of the Gesta Hungarorum. The Gesta was written after 1150 by an unidentified author, who is referred to as Anonymus in modern scholars' works. He wrote primarily of the Magyars' battles with six local rulers, including Menumorut, who are not named in other annals and chronicles. On the other hand, Anonymus did not write of Svatopluk I of Moravia, Luitpold of Bavaria, and other local rulers whose fights with the conquering Magyars were described in late 9th-century or early 10th-century sources. Crișana on the eve of the Hungarian Conquest Burial sites unearthed at Valea lui Mihai and other sites along the Ier River containing remains of horses show that the Avars settled in Crișana shortly after their arrival in the Carpathian Basin in 567. However, few belt mounts decorated with griffins and tendrils or other such features of later Avar craftsmanship have been found in the same region. A distinct group of barrow cemeteries, or tumulithe so-called "Nușfalău–Someșeni" cemeteriesappeared in the lands bordering on "Late Avar" cemeteries in the 8th century. In contrast with the Avars, who practised inhumation, the populations using these cemeteries cremated their dead. "Nușfalău–Someșeni" cemeteries show similarities to some in the East Slavic territories, but they yielded items similar to examples unearthed in West Slavic sites and to "Late Avar" belt mounts. The Avars' power collapsed after Charlemagne and his commanders launched a series of campaigns against the western regions of the Carpathian Basin between 788 and 803. However, Avar groups survived the destruction of their empire: Regino of Prüm wrote that the Magyars first "roamed the wildernesses of the Pannonians and the Avars" in the Carpathian Basin after their flight from the Pontic steppes. According to historian András Róna-Tas, these wildernesses of the Avars (solitudo Avarorum) were situated in the plains along the rivers Tisza and Danube, including Crișana. The collapse of the Avar Khaganate enabled the development of "Great" Moravia, a Slavic polity which emerged in the region of the Middle Danube. Svatopluk I of Moravia, who reigned from 870 to 894, expanded his authority over a large region. Svatopluk's empire included Crişana, according to historian Gyula Kristó, since Emperor Constantine's reference to "great Moravia, the unbaptized" describes the rivers Timiș,