Being a warlike people, the Avars warred with and subjugated much of the local population, and occasionally clashed with the Byzantine Empire.

[2][3] German archeologist Joachim Werner has linked the Vrap Treasure to Bulgar Khan Kuber, who led a successful revolt against the Avar Khaganate in Pannonia in the 670s and led a mixed population of some 70,000 Bulgars, Pannonian Slavs and Byzantine Christians to the Eastern Roman Empire, ultimately settling in the Pelagonia plain in present-day Republic of North Macedonia (cf.

[1] According to Werner, the treasure may have been part of the Khagan's treasury, which was robbed by Kuber and then carried south of the Danube.

The ensemble housed at the Metropolitan Museum of Art was recovered from the Albanian village of Vrap (which rose to international prominence in 1902 when a cache of Avar gold and silver was found in the village)[3] in the early 20th century and given to the museum by J. P. Morgan Jr. in 1917.

The ensemble consists of several gold cups, a silver bucket, several drinking dishes and a jug.