It ’s all too easy to imagine that the Stone Age was a time of wandering warrior men with their women staying at family to tend to the hearth and syndicate , and that sovereign , well - traveled , and authoritative woman are a relatively new phenomenon in human history .
However , anew studysuggests quite the contrary .
The new inquiry , published in the journal PNAS , suggests that it was women who journey vast distance in Western Europe around the turn of the Stone Age and the start of the Bronze Age . Through this geographic expedition of raw nation in hunt of unexampled settlement to start families with , the women would have interchange object and cultural ideas , in turn playing a central role in the development ofEarly Bronze Age technology .
The researcher from Ludwig - Maximilians - Universität in Munich used ancient desoxyribonucleic acid and isotope analyses of 84 skeletons determine in present - day Lechtal in the Dixieland of Augsburg , Germany . This revealed that the majority of women came from outside the surface area , probably from Bohemia or Central Germany , while the men appeared to have remained in the area of their birth . The women ’s beginning also appear to be from a diverse range of places in the nearby realm , as fight down to from one particular partnering Ithiel Town .
" base on analysis of Sr isotope ratio in molars , which admit us to draw conclusions about the origin of people , we were able to ensure that the legal age of women did not spring up from the region , " archeologist Corina Knipperexplained .
" We see a gravid variety of different female lineages , which would happen if over time many women relocated to the Lech Valley from somewhere else , " bring researcher Alissa Mittnik .
The researchers were able to secern that these women were esteem and integrated into the local community through the fact that they were buried in the same way as the native universe . Since all these skeletons were lay to rest over a geological period of 800 years , between 2500 and 1650 BCE , it indicate this was an established “ send ” cultural pattern .
This study looked at just one area of current - solar day Germany , so it ’s hard to tell how widely practiced these substitution were across Europe or even the wider humanity . It also is n’t potential to strictly tell whether women were the combat-ready and unforced participants in the exercise or whether they were forced into matrimony with partnering township . Nevertheless , it looks like no concurrence that these fair sex were traveling up to 500 kilometers ( 300 naut mi ) to other lands and exchanging ideas at a time where a widespread cultural shift was helping bring Europe out of the Stone Age .
