Analysis of bones from 5th-century CE Hungarian cemeteries, located on the border of what was then the Roman province of Pannonia, indicates that the entry into Eastern Europe of the nomadic Huns in the final years of the Roman Empire involved not only looting and violence, but also peaceful coexistence strategies. British and Hungarian researchers analyzed the isotopic composition – the different types of atoms of the same element – of the collagen in the bones and the enamel and dentin of the teeth of the bodies found.
This composition, explain the authors of the work published in the free access journal PLoS ONE, allows you to deduce diet habits. Furthermore, a large variation in isotopic composition in the same skeleton suggests a nomadic way of life, in which the individual consumes food from different geographic origins throughout their life.
The analysis showed that both populations, both the sedentary farmers of the Pannonian frontier and the nomadic/invading Huns, had highly variable diets, suggesting that both groups adopted flexible subsistence strategies. “Nomads may have adopted smaller herds, and Roman colonists may have integrated animal husbandry into their practices”, says a note published by the periodical. “This suggests that, rather than being characterized solely by violence, the end of the Roman Empire may have included cooperation and coexistence of people on the frontier.”
“Historical sources speak of warring bands of nomads on horseback, called Huns or Scythians, attacking settlements along the Danube border and, occasionally, reaching northern Italy or France,” says the article describing the analysis. “These incursions were interpreted as the initial destabilization that set in motion the collapse of the Western Roman Empire.”
The authors go on to remind us that “the narrative surrounding these events often emphasizes the basic cultural difference between the nomads and the sedentary populations of the Roman provinces. In archaeology, however, these dichotomies make them less obvious.”
“The historically documented influx of nomadic populations appears to have led to a widespread change in the subsistence strategies of populations in the Carpathian basin,” the article points out. “Local populations may have integrated themselves into a new economic system based on animal husbandry.”
The authors recognize that the rapid transformation of the local way of life may have occurred in response to a violent invasion and a state of instability brought about by war, but consider that it may have represented a “proactive choice”. And they point to the evidence from the cemeteries studied, where the style of the tombs and the offerings left reveal no signs of “great social upheaval or economic hardship”.
Reference
[ http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0173079 ]
