Population trend in the Merovingian era in Western and Southern Germany

Abstract

According to the common knowledge which is widespread among Early Medieval archaeologists, the number of grave fields and the number of graves in the burial sites are far higher in the 7 th century than in the 6 th century. However, the last supra-regional quantification of this phenomenon was conducted more than fifty years ago (Donat & Ullrich, 1971). This article aims to produce a more exact broad-based quantification of the population growth for Western and Southern Germany with the aid of modern, detailed dating systems. It finds that the population triples in the period from ca. 530 AD to 700 AD. This population growth is slightly higher than that of the Linear Pottery Culture in the Rhineland – a pioneering, agrarian-oriented population in this region which is well researched archaeologically – and slightly lower than in eastern Central Europe at the time of the booming Great Moravia. In modern times it roughly corresponds to the population growth in North America from 1950 to 2015 (Fig. 43). Within the period from about 530 to 670 AD, which can be assessed well because good sources are available, the growth in both the size of the grave fields (Fig. 4, Fig. 5) and their number (Fig. 8, Fig. 11) is linear, not exponential or logistic. The size of the grave fields does not follow a general norm, but is grouped into size classes: there are very small grave fields (approx. 1 farm), small ones (approx. 2 farms), medium-sized ones (approx. 5 farms) and large grave fields (approx. 7 farms); only a very small number of burial sites represent even larger communities (Fig. 37, Fig. 38). The growth in size of the individual grave fields is limited by a social upper growth limit (carrying capacity), which leads to the foundation of new communities when it is reached, i.e. the establishment of new grave fields (and settlements). The detailed analysis of the 34 grave fields investigated reveals that fewer than half the sites exhibit individual, significant deviations from the general trend in certain decades (Fig. 16-Fig. 34). In particular, the times the grave fields begin and cease to be used are sometimes individual. Deviations from the general growth model described which are common to all grave fields do not become apparent, however – especially not for the 6th century AD – which points to natural disasters or high-impact waves of plague with supra-regional effects. This does not negate the existence of the plague in Southern Germany, but its ability to spread and its lethality in this thinly populated, rural area should be scrutinised.

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