Bronze Age Egtved Priestess Walked from Germany to Denmark Before Dying

Analysis of strontium from the remains of a young priestess in the Egtved village in Denmark has overturned earlier belief that she hailed from the region.

The grave of the girl, aged about 16 to 18 years, was unearthed in 1921. The Bronze Age girl was buried in an oak coffin in the year 1370 BC. Researchers at National Museum of Denmark and University of Copenhagen used strontium analysis to learn that the girl hailed from Black Forest region in south-west Germany. Strontium is naturally present in Earth and varies according to geology. It is known accumulates in the hair, teeth and nails.

"I have analyzed the strontium isotopic signatures of the enamel from one of the Egtved Girl's first molars, which was fully formed when she was three or four years old, and the analysis tells us that she was born and lived her first years in a region that is geologically older than and different from the peninsula of Jutland in Denmark," the museum's researcher Karin Margarita Frei said.

Using strontium, researchers were also able to reconstruct the girl's travel two years before her death. The girl's largely intact wool clothing helped them determine her place of origin.

"The wool that her clothing was made from did not come from Denmark and the strontium isotope values vary greatly from wool thread to wool thread. This proves that the wool was made from sheep that either grazed in different geographical areas or that they grazed in one vast area with very complex geology, and the Black Forest's bedrock is characterized by a similarly heterogeneous strontium isotopic range," Frei said.