FOR 1670: Transalpine Mobility and Culture Transfer

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Isotopic mapping has become an indispensable tool for the assessment of mobility and trade in the past. This Research Unit aims at solving one of the most prominent limiting factors inherent to this type of study, which is the overall redundancy of geologically defined isotopic ratios. For several cultural epochs, cremation was the most common if not exclusive burial custom. In this project, cremated bone remains, a rather neglected bioarchaeological substrate, will be systematically investigated for the first time with selected projects dating into the Urnfield Culture, the older and younger Iron Age and imperial Roman Age. Project goals include: (1) constructing an isotopic map of a reference region of eminent archaeological importance (the Alps and its northern surroundings) by application of an isotopic fingerprint consisting of four to five isotopic ratios (?18O, 87Sr/86Sr, 208Pb/204Pb, 207Pb/204Pb, 206Pb/204Pb), (2) large-scale analysis of cremated material, (3) conducting an in-depth mineralogical identification of the nature of the analysed material, (4) establishing an isotopic map for the reference region that is suitable for all archaeological strata, (5) defining an individual isotopic fingerprint by novel data mining methods, (6) producing a fine-scaled reconstruction of place of origin and direction of migration using non-local skeletal human and faunal finds, (7) thus providing entirely new insights into social and cultural change in prehistoric times, (8) finally integrating the data into a freely accessible data bank (worldwide data sharing).