image/svg+xml3 VII/1/2016 INTERDISCIPLINARIA ARCHAEOLOGICA NATURAL SCIENCES IN ARCHAEOLOGY homepage: http://www.iansa.eu Editorial IANSA 1/2016 Interdisciplinary Research of the Migration Period Cemetery at Prague-Zličín, Czech Republic Jiří Vávra Welcome to the frst issue of IANSA for 2016. This time the whole issue is devoted to the results of an interdisciplinary excavation of the largest known skeletal burial ground from the Migration Period in Bohemia. Before you read the articles, let me share some basic facts with you about the cemetery.The rescue archaeological excavation of the burial site took place along Hrozenkovská Street in Prague-Zličín, Czech Republic. It was carried out between November  2005 and August 2008 in cooperation with the Prague City Museum (excavation in 2005–2006) and Labrys Company (2007–2008). The excavation leaders were the Prague City Museum’s Milan Kuchařík and Jiří Vávra for the Labrys Company. The archaeologists Eduard Droberjar and Jaroslav Jiřík, who specialize in the Roman and Migration Periods, also took part in the research as consultants.The complete skeletal burial ground belongs to the so-called Vinařice Group from the earlier phase of the Migration Period. Based on portable fnds such as metal brooches, buckles, pendants, fne glassware,  etc ., the duration of the cemetery is dated to stages D2 to D3 according to Jaroslav Tejral,  i.e. to the period from the 2 nd third of the 5 th  century AD to around the turn of the century (from  the 5 th to the 6 th  century AD). Altogether 173 graves with 176 inhumation burials were recorded in the feld in which at least 179 individuals were buried. There were several double burials at the site.During the excavation we lowered the entire fll of all the graves at certain intervals in mechanical layers, thus creating and documenting horizontal profles of the natural strata within the graves. This methodology was partly inspired by the archaeological excavation of the burial site at Immenbeck-Kattenberg by Buxtehude (dist. Stade, Lower Saxony, Germany). In this way a sequence of documentation levels is available for every grave complex, describing the grave cut, secondary pit, and their entire contents. Artefacts were collected and recorded by natural strata. Already in the feld we were employing methods leading to future interdisciplinary research. Therefore we made a sieving and fotation of the grave fll and collected samples for  palynological and palaeo-parasitological analyses from the bottom level of graves, and so on.Taking a look at the overall plan of the cemetery, we can see that the graves are situated in irregular and incomplete rows in an approximately north-south orientation (Figure 1). They form a main group in the central position accompanied by two smaller groups and four solitary graves. The grave  cuts were rectangular in shape and approximately west-east in orientation. Their vertical walls usually became perimeter ledges at a certain level above the bottom, thus establishing a place for putting the wooden cofn with the deceased into the grave. The buried people were placed in graves with their heads to the west, supine. The depth of the grave cuts from the surface (after soil stripping) varied from 12 centimetres to 2.6 metres with the average being 1.2 metres. A total of 28 graves contained niches of various sizes, at diferent levels from the bottom and over the head of the buried individuals, usually situated in the west walls. They usually contained ceramic and especially glass vessels.Almost all the graves at Prague-Zličín had been disturbed by secondary interference, which had left traces of the ancient reopening of graves. This was a very important circumstance which afected the inner structure and arrangement of all the disturbed burials. Every such grave complex consisted of two cuts and their fllings: the original grave cut and the secondary pit, which occurred usually at the west side of the graves. According to several feld observations it can be concluded that the graves had been reopened shortly after their creation. The structure of layers within the secondary pits implies that the process of reflling took place gradually and over a longer period of time by erosion of walls and the surrounding surface. In some graves, such layers spread even into the hollow space within the undisturbed parts of cofns. During the processing and evaluating of artefacts, as well as  Volume VII     ●     Issue 1/2016     ●     Pages 3–10
image/svg+xmlIANSA 2016 ● VII/1 ● 3–10Jiří Vávra: Interdisciplinary Research of the Migration Period Cemetery at Prague-Zličín, Czech Republic 4 the human and animal bones and especially environmental samples, it was necessary to take into account whether the investigated object or sample had come from the grave fll or from that of a secondary pit, which could include a variety of intrusions and various structures for the environmental record.The cemetery at Prague-Zličín is the only one of this period to have been excavated in its totality. At the same time it is the largest yet-known burial site of the early Migration Period in the Czech Republic – and also an important site for the research of the little-explored transition period between Late Antiquity and the early Middle Ages. The research of this burial site changes our established ideas about the culture of the Migration Period in Bohemia: it illustrates broad cultural contacts with geographically-remote areas in Europe and also ofers a rich set of sources for further anthropological and interdisciplinary scientifc research,  e.g. in the study of reopening of graves in the Migration Period.The feld excavation has already been the work of a team and this is even more true in the evaluation of its results. Very early on it was quite clear to us that a thorough interpretation of such a cemetery would require a broad interdisciplinary approach and even international cooperation and research. We therefore collected the environmental samples, made contact with local as well as foreign scientifc institutions and experts, such as the Römisch-Germanisches Zentralmuseum in Mainz and colleagues in Munich and Regensburg in Germany, and consulted certain topics with other experts Europe-wide, from as far afeld as Great Britain, France, Germany, Slovakia, Bulgaria and Turkey. One of the results of such international cooperation is the book “Barbarian Graves at Prague-Zličín. The World of the Living and the Dead of the Migration Period”, which was published by the City of Prague Museum in 2015 to accompany an exhibition of the same name. The book won the prize Gloria musaealis for 2015 in the category Museum publication of the year and you can read a review of it by Eduard Droberjar in the current issue.The articles presented in this issue of IANSA deal with various environmental and anthropological aspects of the  Figure 1.   The overall plan of the excavation area at Prague-Zličín. 0 100 m
image/svg+xmlIANSA 2016 ● VII/1 ● 3–10Jiří Vávra: Interdisciplinary Research of the Migration Period Cemetery at Prague-Zličín, Czech Republic 5 site and its population at Prague-Zličín, including dental microwear and teeth analyses, evaluation of botanical macrofossils, charcoals and pollens, and the investigation of the pathological features on human bones and a rare fnd of human hair. All environmental and anthropological analyses that have been done so far are listed in the Table 1. The article with the analysis of animal bones from the graves also presents another unusual fnd for this period: that of a dog burial which was discovered not far from the cemetery. In addition, the issue also contains contributions by German authors, presenting an evaluation and archaeological excavation of burial sites from the same historical period in Bavaria, thus bringing a broader and comparative context for further future research.
image/svg+xmlIANSA 2016 ● VII/1 ● 3–10Jiří Vávra: Interdisciplinary Research of the Migration Period Cemetery at Prague-Zličín, Czech Republic 6 Table 1.   Summary of analysed individuals/graves from Prague-Zličín cemetery and performed analyses. SkeletonFeatureSkull preservationPostcranial preservationSexAgeBody heightMicrowear analysisPathological observationsGeochemical analysisParasitological analysisArchaeobotanical and palynological analysesTrichological analysis 14 C datingGrave goods 150011Nadultyes250113M 30–40 yes350211Nadultyes450311Nadultmacroyes550411Nadultyes650611N subadult 750721N 6–7 yes851821N 14–17 yesyesyesyes1151922N juv-ad yesyesmacroyesyes952022Nadultus Iyes1252111Nadultyesyes1052233M50+yesyes1352322N 4.5–5 yesyesyesyes1452413Nadultyes1552511N subadult yes1652722F 16–19 yesyesyes1752833F 40–50 (45) yesmacroyes1852833M 45–47 yesyesyes2552943F45+ 182.1 yesyes1953043F 45–50168.7 yesyesyesyes2153111Nadultyes2053211Nadultyesmacroyes2353331Nadult2253431Madult2453533F 30–40160.1 yesyes2753611N subadult 2653721N 3–4 yesyes2853832Nadultyesyes2953911Nadult3054013Nadultyesyes3154111Nadultyes3254211Nadultyesyes3354312N juv-ad 3454453F 30–40167.7 yesyes3554542F 45–50 yesyes3654612Nadult3754711Nadultyes3854811Nadult3954911N subadult
image/svg+xmlIANSA 2016 ● VII/1 ● 3–10Jiří Vávra: Interdisciplinary Research of the Migration Period Cemetery at Prague-Zličín, Czech Republic 7 SkeletonFeatureSkull preservationPostcranial preservationSexAgeBody heightMicrowear analysisPathological observationsGeochemical analysisParasitological analysisArchaeobotanical and palynological analysesTrichological analysis 14 C datingGrave goods 4055021N 24–30 yesyes4155121N 9–12 yes4255221N 24–30 yes4355411Nadult44a55522M 16–20 yesyes 44b 55521N5yes4555611Nadult4655711Nadultyes4756323M 30–35 yesyes4856422N 15–18 yes4956511N subadult yesyes5056611Nadult5257011Nadultyes5357121Nadultyes5457254F 35–45171.9 yesyesyes5557322M 20–40177.3 yesyes5657443F 35–45161.7 yesyes5757522N 17–20 yes5858522N 16–19 yes6158623N 35–40 yesyes6058723F 35–40186.8 yesyes5958812Nadultyes6259032M 45–55 (55) yesyes6359154M45 168.9 yesyesyesyes6459221N 40–50 yes6559443M 40–50 168yesyesyesyes6659622N 22–25 yes6759933N 16–20 yesyespollenyes6860011Nadult6960111Nadult7060211N subadult yesyes7160311Nadultyes7260411Nadultyesyesyes7360611Nadult7460711Nadultyes7560821N 4–5 yesyes7660911N subadult yesyes7961233M45+yes Table 1.   Summary of analysed individuals/graves from Prague-Zličín cemetery and performed analyses. ( Continuation )
image/svg+xmlIANSA 2016 ● VII/1 ● 3–10Jiří Vávra: Interdisciplinary Research of the Migration Period Cemetery at Prague-Zličín, Czech Republic 8 SkeletonFeatureSkull preservationPostcranial preservationSexAgeBody heightMicrowear analysisPathological observationsGeochemical analysisParasitological analysisArchaeobotanical and palynological analysesTrichological analysis 14 C datingGrave goods 8061311Nadultyes8161411Nadult8261511Nadult8365011Nadultyes8465112Nadultyes8566011Nadultyesyes7772144M 40–50 (50)177.6 yesyesyesyes7872253F 45–55160.4 yesyesyesyesyes8672311Nadult8772422N 30–35 yesyes8872521N7yes8972621Nadultyesyes9072911Nadultyes9173011Nadultyesyes9277322N 30–35 yes9377411Nadultyesyes9577833F50 165.6 yesyesyes9677911Nadult9478011Nadultyesyes9778111Nadultyesmacro+ pollenyes9878213Fadultyes9978312Nadult10078423N40+yes10178533N 3–4 yesyes10278611Nadult10378721N7yes10478811Nadultyes10578921N 35–40 yes10679011Nadult10779513Mmaturus 181.2 yesyespollenyes10879622N10yespollenyes10979733M40?yesyesyespollenyes11079833F 40–50 yesyesyes11179913Nadultyes11280033M 45–55 yesyespollenyes11380133M 45–50 yesyesyespollenyes11480223F 20–24 yespollenyes11580311N subadult pollen Table 1.   Summary of analysed individuals/graves from Prague-Zličín cemetery and performed analyses. ( Continuation )
image/svg+xmlIANSA 2016 ● VII/1 ● 3–10Jiří Vávra: Interdisciplinary Research of the Migration Period Cemetery at Prague-Zličín, Czech Republic 9 SkeletonFeatureSkull preservationPostcranial preservationSexAgeBody heightMicrowear analysisPathological observationsGeochemical analysisParasitological analysisArchaeobotanical and palynological analysesTrichological analysis 14 C datingGrave goods 11680412Nadultpollenyes11780522N50+yespollenyes11880621N40+pollenyes11980733M 45–50 (50) yesyesyespollenyes12080811N subadult macro + pollenyes12280911Nadultyespollenyes121a81843F 40–50 yespollenyes 121b 81821N5yes12382113Nadultpollenyes12582611Nadult126150421N 30–40 yes127150523F 20–24 pollenyes128150634F 20–25167.8 yesyesyespollenyes129150722F 15–17 yesyes130150811Nadultmacro + pollenyes131150933M50+ 171.6 yesyesyesyespollenyes132154433M 35–45 yesyesyesmacro + pollenyesyes133154521F 30–40 macroyesyes134154621N 20–35 macroyes135154721N5macroyesyes136a154822N 20–35 macroyesyes 136b 154821N 4–6 yes137154921N50+macroyesyes138155022N50+macroyesyes139155121N 0.5–2 r pollen140155221N subadult pollen141155333M 15–17 yesmacroyes142155544M50+ 183.6 yesyesyesyesmacro + pollenyesyes143155635N5yesyespollenyesyes144155734N12yesmacroyesyes145155933M50+yesyesmacro + pollenyesyes146156512Nadultmacro + pollenyesyes147156611N subadult macroyes148156711N subadult macroyes149156811N subadult macro + pollenyes150156943F 40–50 yesyesyesmacro + pollenyes151157033F 40–50 yesyesyesmacroyesyes152157132N 24–30 yesmacroyesyes Table 1.   Summary of analysed individuals/graves from Prague-Zličín cemetery and performed analyses. ( Continuation )
image/svg+xmlIANSA 2016 ● VII/1 ● 3–10Jiří Vávra: Interdisciplinary Research of the Migration Period Cemetery at Prague-Zličín, Czech Republic 10 SkeletonFeatureSkull preservationPostcranial preservationSexAgeBody heightMicrowear analysisPathological observationsGeochemical analysisParasitological analysisArchaeobotanical and palynological analysesTrichological analysis 14 C datingGrave goods 153157232M 18–20 macroyesyes154157344M 35–45169.4 yesyesyesmacro + pollenyes155157411Nadultmacroyesyes156157511Nadultmacroyes157157622F 13–14 yespollenyes158157911Nadultmacroyesyes159159322N 30–35 yesmacroyesyes160159433F50+yesyesmacroyes161159523N 35–45167.8 yesmacroyesyes162159643F 30–40167.3 yesyesyesmacroyesyes163159744F50+ 165.8 macroyesyes164159843M55+ 179.5 yesmacroyesyes165159922F 45–55 macroyesyes166160013Madultmacroyesyes167160132N 5–6 macroyesyes168160221F55+yesmacroyesyes169160322N 30–40 macroyesyes170160411N subadult macro + pollenyes171160942N 45–55 macroyesyes172a161043F 20–24 macroyesyes 172b 161013Fadultyes173161132N55+yesmacroyes174161222F 40–50 macroyesyes175161355F 40–50164.8 macroyesyes176161433F 35–40 macroyesyes177161521N 4–7 macroyes178161621N 1–3 macro Table 1.   Summary of analysed individuals/graves from Prague-Zličín cemetery and performed analyses. ( Continuation )