The 84 remains analyzed dated to between 2500 and 1650 BCE and came from the Lechtal, in southern Germany. They were found in cemeteries that belonged to individual homesteads containing between one and several dozen burials made over a period of several generations. Larger villages were not yet established in Lechtal, so homesteads’ cemeteries were pretty representative of the local population.
The study found that the majority of women did not originate in the area . Their burials did not differ from that of the native population, though, indicating that the formerly foreign women were integrated into the local community. This was also not a case of chain migration, where Lechtal men tended to marry women from a particular clan or region – there was great diversity found in the women’s lineages. Meanwhile, men tended to have grown up in Lechtal, and were buried near where they were born.
The long time span of the analysis means the pattern of men staying and women moving persisted over a period of 800 years, when the area experienced a transition from the Neolithic to the Early Bronze Age.
