Maura De Coster

In the Lower Rhine region, traces of past lives are preserved not only in objects and landscapes, but within the human body itself. Human remains retain chemical signatures formed through daily practices such as eating and moving through different environments. This dissertation investigates mobility and diet during the Roman period through isotope analysis of human remains, reconstructing patterns of movement and food practices across different communities. By combining data from multiple sites, it examines variations between regions, site types, and population groups. The dataset includes both inhumed and cremated individuals, addressing a significant gap in previous research, as cremation dominates the archaeological record in the Roman Netherlands. A central aim is to integrate isotopic data into archaeological research questions concerning mobility, diet, and population composition. The study applies strontium, oxygen, and carbon isotope analysis to human skeletal remains from sites along the Lower Rhine. Strontium and oxygen isotopes are used to investigate mobility and the geographic origin of dietary resources, while carbon isotopes provide additional information on food consumption. Throughout, the study emphasises that isotope values reflect the origin of consumed resources and are shaped by both human movement and food circulation. The empirical core consists of three case studies. The first examines the Nijmegen region, comparing Iron Age and Roman period populations from rural, urban, and military contexts. Strontium isotope ratios and concentrations from cremated long bones are used to investigate dietary input. The results show differences between contexts, with urban and military groups displaying higher strontium concentrations and a narrower range of isotope ratios compared to some earlier populations. These patterns are discussed in relation to changes in food supply and provisioning systems, while accounting for variability within and between sites. The second case study focuses on Valkenburg, combining isotope analysis with ancient DNA data to investigate population composition. The results indicate a wide range of isotope values in both cremated and inhumed individuals, suggesting variation in mobility. Genetic data similarly show diversity within the sampled population. Together, these datasets provide information on community composition and allow comparison between isotopic and genetic patterns. The third case study presents isotopic data from a Late Roman cemetery in Bonn. Developed in collaboration with the Limes and Legion project, this data-focused chapter provides strontium isotope ratios and elemental concentrations for selected individuals, situated within their archaeological context. Its primary aim is to make these data available for future research and facilitate comparison with other datasets. Across these case studies, isotopic patterns vary between regions, site types, and time periods. The findings highlight the importance of archaeological context, sampling strategy, and methodological limitations when interpreting results. Isotope data reflect biological processes, environmental conditions, and cultural practices, requiring careful contextualisation. The final chapter synthesises the results and reflects on the strengths and limitations of isotope analysis within archaeological research. It identifies directions for future work, including expanded datasets, refined baseline data, and closer integration with other evidence. Taken together, this dissertation provides a large-scale isotopic dataset for the Roman period in the Lower Rhine region, addressing mobility and diet across multiple contexts. By bringing cremated and inhumed individuals into the same analytical framework, it broadens the scope of regional isotope research. Rather than presenting a single pattern, the results reveal a range of outcomes shaped by local conditions and wider connections. The study demonstrates that evidence for past lives is preserved not only in the spaces people built or objects they left behind, but also in the chemical traces carried within their remains, where aspects of movement and diet persist long after those lives have ended.

This study investigates dietary practices and local interaction in Roman and pre-Roman Nijmegen, the Netherlands, through strontium isotope ratios (⁸⁷Sr/⁸⁶Sr) and concentration measurements on cremated human remains from rural, urban, and military contexts, which primarily reflect the geological provenance of dietary strontium. Located along the Lower Rhine borderlands, Nijmegen formed a key node within the Batavian region, where local communities intersected with imperial networks. The results reveal isotopic contrasts between site types: urban and military groups tend to display higher strontium concentrations, possibly consistent with greater engagement with salt-preserved and salt-rich foods, while in the northern contexts relatively stable concentrations alongside a narrowing of isotope ratios may suggest continuity in dietary practices, potentially including earlier traditions of salt consumption. These patterns indicate that dietary change was not uniform, but shaped by the interaction between emerging imperial foodways and pre-existing local practices. Rather than reflecting simple differences in access, the isotopic evidence points to varied and context-dependent forms of engagement with Roman provisioning systems.

This protocol describes in great detail all the steps that must be taken for strontium isotope analysis on archaeological dental elements, from the receipt of the samples to the deposition of the data generated by Thermal Ionisation Mass Spectrometry (TIMS).

This protocol describes in great detail all the steps that must be taken for strontium isotope analysis on archaeological cremated remains, from the receipt of the samples to the deposition of the data generated by Thermal Ionisation Mass Spectrometry (TIMS).

Recovery and identification of heavily burnt and fragmented skeletal remains pose significant challenges in fire and arson investigations. The ability to identify individuals is crucial in such cases, prompting extensive research into various techniques to aid in the identification process, including isotopic analysis. Although direct personal identification is not achievable through isotopic analysis of skeletal remains, it serves as a valuable tool for obtaining chemical elements of the biological profile. Strontium (Sr), oxygen (O), and carbon (C) isotope analyses have been widely used in archeological contexts but are relatively new approaches in the medicolegal domain. Oxygen isotope analysis, for instance, offers insights into the burning temperature, while strontium isotope analysis provides valuable information for tracing the individual's movement across geologically distinct landscapes. Consequently, the investigation of the impact of heat on the biogenic isotope composition of human bones in forensic contexts has gained significant attention. This article presents a comprehensive overview of the key archeological and forensic questions addressed by Sr–O–C isotope analysis of burnt skeletal remains. By examining the current state of the art and prospects, we aim to contribute to a broader understanding and potential advancements in the field of forensic isotope research.This article is categorized under: Forensic Biology > Interpretation of Biological Evidence Forensic Anthropology > Trauma Analysis

Summary: Today, Germanic languages, including German, English, Frisian, Dutch and the Nordic languages, are widely spoken in northwest Europe. However, key aspects of the assumed arrival and diversification of this linguistic group remain contentious ^1–3 . By adding 712 new ancient human genomes we find an archaeologically elusive population entering Sweden from the Baltic region by around 4000 BP. This population became widespread throughout Scandinavia by 3500 BP, matching the contemporaneous distribution of Palaeo-Germanic, the Bronze Age predecessor of Proto-Germanic ^4–6 . These Baltic immigrants thus offer a new potential vector for the first Germanic speakers to arrive in Scandinavia, some 800 years later than traditionally assumed ^7–12 . Following the disintegration of Proto-Germanic ^13–16 , we find by 1650 BP a southward push from Southern Scandinavia into presumed Celtic-speaking areas, including Germany, Poland and the Netherlands. During the Migration Period (1575–1375 BP), we see this ancestry representing West Germanic Anglo-Saxons in Britain, and Langobards in southern Europe. We find a related large-scale northward migration into Denmark and South Sweden corresponding with historically attested Danes and the expansion of Old Norse. These movements have direct implications for multiple linguistic hypotheses. Our findings show the power of combining genomics with historical linguistics and archaeology in creating a unified, integrated model for the emergence, spread and diversification of a linguistic group.