Abstract

Mobility during the first millennium AD across Europe is both well attested and highly contested. The lines of evidence are now broadening with more genetic studies (both modern and ancient DNA ), and a larger corpus of stable isotope data to draw on alongside the material culture and historical sources. In this talk I utilise new and published isotopic data for early medieval England and western Europe to clearly demonstrate migration to England in the early middle ages at a large scale, with fluctuating patterns of mobility across the first millennium AD. I also show that migration was gendered, and furthermore that there are differences in the volume and nature of migrants to different areas of England, with little to suggest migrants and “locals” were treated different in death. This suggests a model of large-scale and relatively continuous migration across the period, at odds with previous models of elite-replacement and cultural segregation. I also demonstrate that the isotopic data from early medieval burials shows evidence for climate change and a possible “beer event horizon”.