The dietary trends and social relations in the migration period

Central Europe is situated just in the place, where two main eastern and western migration waves overlaped in the Migration period (4th to 6th centuries). The progress of the eastern migration wave, its beginning, course and disappearance is characterised by deformations of skulls. The deformations are indirect expression of the migrations of the Huns and the Sarmatian-Alanian tribes. Diet and social stratification at the Sarmatian burial ground Madaras was reconstructed based on the analyses of contents of trace elements Sr, Zn, Pb in 44 skeletons. At Madaras the principal foodstuffs in the diet were of vegetal origin. Based on statistical testing by means of Scheff's test a significant difference (p = 0.0003) in strontium content in the bones of rich women (garnitures 200, 300, 400) was found being the average 506 microg Sr/g of bone) compared with men with iron knife and the individuals without grave goods (garnitures 100, 800) where the average was 268 microg Sr/g of bone. Western migration wave with German tribes in the 6th century characterised by artificial grinding of front teeth was found in the largest Langorbardic burial-ground in Moravia at Luzice. Compact bone of the femora from two Moravian Prelangobardic sites (Vyskov and Strachotin, N-20 skeletons) of German population dated from Migration period was analysed by content of lead as a cultural factor and Zn and Sr from a health point of view. The Pb exposure was much lower than that from the Roman period (5.7-23 microg Pb/g of bone in the German tribes on the north of Danube) being on an average below 3 microg Pb/g of bone tissue. Content of zinc in migrating German population in the region of the middle Danube (Strachotin, at an average of 188 microg Zn/g of bone; Vyskov, at an average of 111 microg Zn/g of bone) are lower than those from the original settlements (230-500 microg Zn/g of bone). The strontium content in bones was directly proportional to the level of social rank. From 20 analysed skeletons from Strachotin and Vyskov signifies the statistic difference between the social groups of warriors in which concentration of strontium (340 microSr/g bone) was higher compared with woman with jewels (204 microSr) and graves without grave goods (228 micro Sr). The societies in the Germans and the Sarmatians were less differentiated than in the La Tène period. Especially the garnitures 400, 500 and 600 feature little differentiation. The garniture 500 is even missing in the Prelangobardic population at Strachotin.