New founding date - Centuries-old skeletons - Neufahrn older than thought
The community of Neufahrn, north of Munich, is known to be a few hundred years older than the state capital. Skeletal finds now show: The beginnings of the 20,000 inhabitant town lie significantly further back in time. With the help of scientific investigations of the 2021 skeletons found at the Pfarrweg and the Mesnerhaus, the age of Neufahrn can be pushed back by at least 100 years, as reported by Ernest Lang, chairman of the Homeland and History Association Neufahrn.
Ortshistory needs to be rewritten
"The previously taught and also officially described local history in the schools is no longer tenable," said the local historian. Until now, the founding date of Neufahrn had been dated to 804, as the city founding date for Munich on June 14, 1158.
The researchers found settlement remains and burials that reach back to the early Middle Ages. The men and women from the Pfarrweg were buried in a time period between 650 and 770 AD in the area of their farms. The burials began at the latest around 700 in the area of the later Mesnerhaus. The finds also showed that there was already a God's house with a cemetery at the site of the present church in the 8th century, as reported by Amira Adaileh, district representative of the Bavarian Monument Protection Authority.
Different burial customs
"People built several homesteads here, from which the remains of typical, sunken-into-the-ground house foundations as well as some long houses have been preserved," said district archaeologist Delia Hurka about the early settlement. Not unusual were the finds of seven burials within farms with a dwelling house and ancillary buildings. It concerned two trios of a woman and two men in the north, a man and two women a little further south, and a solitary burial of a man. They were all buried in a westerly direction.
Radiocarbon method provides insight
A total of 17 skeletons - six from the area of the Pfarrweg and eleven from the area of the Mesnerhaus - were examined using the radiocarbon method. In this process, the radioactive carbon isotope C-14 is measured, which decays with a certain half-life and thus provides information about the age of certain objects. The results will be made publicly accessible together with other finds from the community area in display cases in the renovated Mesnerhaus.
- The skeleton find at the Pfarrweg and the Mesnerhaus in Neufahrn, located north of Munich in Bavaria, Germany, has led to significant revisions in the town's historical timeline.
- The radiocarbon method was used to analyze 17 skeletons discovered at the Pfarrweg and the Mesnerhaus, providing insights that pushed back the age of Neufahrn by at least 100 years.
- The archaeological findings in Neufahrn suggest that women and men lived in this area during the early Middle Ages, as evidenced by skeletons buried between 650 and 770 AD near their farms.
- The commune of Neufahrn has a rich archaeological history, with skeletal finds dating back thousands of years, showcasing diverse burial customs and early settlement patterns.
- The new findings from the archaeological dig in Neufahrn have sparked curiosity among local historians and archaeology enthusiasts in Munich and the wider Bavarian region, contributing to a deeper understanding of Germany's historical past.
