Tracing residential mobility during the Merovingian period: An isotopic analysis of human remains from the Upper Rhine Valley, Germany

摘要

ObjectivesWritten sources have provided information about the rise of Merovingian power and their territorial conquests after the disintegration of the Western Roman Empire, but the extent to which altered power relations in the newly annexed territories reshaped regional and local communities is poorly understood. The early medieval cemetery of Dirmstein, located in the Upper Rhine Valley, is one of the rare sites bearing archeological evidence of simultaneous use by an indigenous community and newcomers from outside the Merovingian core area, and it offers the opportunity to investigate residential mobility at the former Roman Rhine frontier during the Merovingian period.