The graves of the Fallward cemetry in the mirror of their organic objects - research on the funerary customs of the late Roman and Migration Period in northwestern Germany

在库克斯黑文区的Wurt Fallward北部，20世纪90年代挖掘出了200个4世纪和5世纪的火葬墓和60个土葬墓。他们属于一个埋葬的地方，是奠定了在该地区的海滩山脊下威悉河。一些坟墓坑被挖到沼泽粘土化石的深处。在这里，厌氧环境为有机材料的保存提供了最佳条件。除了骨头之外，木制坟墓结构以及由木材和纺织品制成的坟墓物品的完整清单，以及放置在坟墓中的植物遗骸都或多或少地被完整地保存下来。因此，长期以来，对这一重要墓地的详细评估和出版一直被视为研究的迫切需要。该项目自2020年以来一直由DFG资助。到目前为止，对坟墓库存的研究在中欧北方是无与伦比的，为重建Barbaricum晚期古代定居区的埋葬传统开辟了独特的视角。此外，还可以评估易北河-威悉河三角洲中各种当代遗址的超区域接触是否也反映在Wurt Fallward的当地埋葬仪式中。在该项目的第一阶段，调查重点是六个保存最完好的墓葬。其中，有未经处理的有机文物和发现层，其中一些是通过块提升固定的。考古学、纺织考古学、树木年代学、人类学、古遗传学和古植物学中使用的跨学科方法是调查的支柱。它们的结合应用已经使许多新的见解的社会经济和社会文化地位，以及当地殡葬社区的跨区域接触。在现在申请的第二个项目阶段-也设计运行36个月-成功的跨学科研究将继续和加强。初步完成对上述墓葬的研究。但是，保存不善或装备不太齐全的墓葬以及尚未处理的火葬坟墓也将成为考古、纺织考古和考古植物学调查的重点。调查将再次包括对骨骼的人类学和DNA分析，但还应包括对动物骨骼的考古动物学观察。通过考古学分析，特别是对阿尔卑斯山以北地区独特的木制配件上可见的颜色进行全面调查，以前的研究将经历重大扩展。总之，本文的研究对于了解罗马帝国时期和移民时期德国西北部的聚落史和社会史具有重要意义。

North of the Wurt Fallward, district of Cuxhaven, 200 cremation and 60 inhumation graves from the 4th and 5th centuries were excavated in the 1990s. They belong to a burial place that was laid out in the area of a beach ridge of the Lower Weser River. Some grave pits were dug deep down into the fossil marsh clay. Here, the anaerobic environment offered optimal conditions for the preservation of organic materials. In addition to the bones, wooden grave structures as well as complete inventories of grave goods made of wood and textiles but also remains of plants laid into the graves were more or less completely preserved. The detailed evaluation and publication of this important graveyard has therefore long been regarded as a desideratum of research. This is now implemented in the project, which has been funded by the DFG since 2020. The research done so far on the grave inventories, which are unparalleled in northern Central Europe, opened up a unique perspective for the reconstruction of burial traditions in a late antique settlement region of the Barbaricum. In addition, it may be evaluated whether the supra-regional contacts postulated for various contemporary sites in the Elbe-Weser triangle, are also reflected in the local burial rites of the Wurt Fallward. During the first phase of the project, the investigations focused on the six best-preserved burials. Of these, there are unprocessed organic artefacts and find layers, some of which have been secured by block-lifting. An interdisciplinary bundle of methods used in archaeology, textile archaeology, dendrochronology, anthropology, paleogenetics and paleobotany is the backbone of the investigation. Their combined application has already enabled numerous new insights into the socio-economic and socio-cultural status as well as to the supra-regional contacts of the local funeral community. In the now applied second project phase – also designed to run for 36 months –, the successful interdisciplinary research will be continued and intensified. Initially, the research on the above-mentioned graves shall be completed. But also the poorly preserved or less extensively equipped burials as well as the cremation graves that have not yet been processed, will be in the focus of the archaeological, textile-archaeological and archaeobotanical investigations. The investigations will again include anthropological and aDNA analyses of the skeletons, but shall additionally comprise also archaeozoological observations of the animal bones. With archaeometric analyses, in particular a comprehensive investigation of the colours visible on wooden accessories, which are unique for the regions north of the Alps, the previous studies will experience a significant expansion. Altogether, it is to be expected that the research will contribute considerably to the understanding of the settlement history and social history of north-western Germany in the time of the Roman Empire and the Migration Period.