IntranetOne Topoi group of the research area “Spatial Environment” (A) is investigating the genesis and spread of these innovations. Mobility and migration are important factors here. In order to reconstruct them, natural scientific analyses based upon prehistoric archaeological data are conducted. Isotope-chemical analyses of teeth and bone from burial mound sites, for example, can provide information on changes of location of buried individuals. The examination of animal teeth can yield evidence of specialized cattle breeding in certain areas. How mobile people were in antiquity is shown by wheel and wagon models at archaeological sites in northwestern Ukraine, which suggest that the innovation of the wagon with solid wheels spread as early as the fourth millennium before Christ.
Two new publications review the actual research of this group: