Boat burial reveals leprosy strain in fifth-century Germany

AI Summary

Researchers identified a leprosy strain in a fifth-century individual buried with a boat at the Fallward burial ground in present-day northern Germany. The findings provide evidence of human mobility during a period of upheaval and migration across Europe.

Visigothic and Vandal forces marched into Italy and conquered Rome; the Huns spread fear and terror on their campaigns through Western Europe; the Franks expanded their domain southward—the fifth century was an era of profound, often violent upheavals in Europe, and at the same time one of great mobility. Researchers from the Institute of Clinical Molecular Biology (IKMB) at Christian-Albrechts-University in Kiel and the Lower Saxony Institute for Historical Coastal Research (NIhK) have now identified a specific example of this mobility in the Fallward burial ground in what is now the district of Cuxhaven.