Theme:
5. Theories and methods in archaeology: interactions between disciplines
Session format:
Regular session
Title:
Mobility and Population Transformation in the Migration Period and Early Middle Ages: Changing Societies and Identities
Content:
Europe witnessed multiple population shifts between the decline of the Roman Empire, which are still a focus of archaeological and historical research today. However, changes of the archaeological record can reflect other modes of exchange than the actual movement of people, so that the importance of residential changes of individuals or groups during the Migration Period and Early Middle Ages remain largely unclear. The integration of multiple strains of evidence from the archaeological data as well as strontium isotope and ancient DNA analyses allows working towards models of individual and group movements. It will also lead to a better and more differentiated understanding of the role of residential changes and the interaction between local and newly arriving, foreign groups. Moreover, carbon and nitrogen isotope data provide invaluable information about dietary habits and their alterations over time.
We invite contributions that bring together evidence of material culture, burial customs, local and non-local individuals in cemeteries, genetic implications on kinship structures and population history as well as subsistence strategies. The session aims at evaluating coincidences of changes of these aspects over time. It also invites reflection on the role of human mobility in what is considered the “Migration Period” and its implications regarding a multi-facetted population history. The section has been inspired by the ongoing German-Hungarian project Mobility and Population Transformation in the Carpathian Basin from the 5th to the 7th Century AD: Changing Societies and Identities (PIs: Tivadar Vida and Corina Knipper) and pursues putting its findings into a wider European context.
Keywords:
Mobility, Diet, Burial customs, Population History, Stable isotope analysis, Bioarchaeology
Session associated with MERC:
no
Session associated with CIfA:
no
Session associated with SAfA:
no
Session associated with CAA:
no
Session associated with DGUF:
no
Session associated with other:
Main organiser:
Corina Knipper (Germany) 1
Co-organisers:
Tivadar Vida (Hungary) 2
Daniel Winger (Germany) 3
Affiliations:
1. Curt Engelhorn Center Archaeometry, Mannheim
2. ELTE-Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest
3. Universität Rostock
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