Publication details
Možnosti a meze výzkumu pohřebišť novokřtěnců na jižní Moravě z pohledu biologické antropologie, historie a religionistiky
| Title in English | The Possibilities and Limits of Research on Anabaptist Burial Sites in South Moravia from the Perspectives of Biological Anthropology, History and Religious Studies |
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| Authors | |
| Year of publication | 2023 |
| Type | Article in Periodical |
| Magazine / Source | Anthropologia Integra |
| MU Faculty or unit | |
| Citation | |
| Web | Stránky vydavatele. |
| Doi | http://dx.doi.org/10.5817/AI2023-2-7 |
| Keywords | Anabaptists; Hutterites; funerary practices; burial sites; skeletal remains; South Moravia |
| Attached files | |
| Description | The study deals with the problem of identification and localization of Anabaptist burial sites in South Moravia. The Anabaptists were an internally diverse religious current of the Reformation that emerged in the 1520s in areas with German-speaking populations. As a result of persecution by religiously major Catholic or Protestant authorities, they were migrating to Moravia since 1526. The Anabaptists differed from the local population in their ethnic origin, language, way of life, and religious beliefs. They left a distinctive and still noticeable trace in Moravian culture. Very little information is available about their burial sites, graves, funerary traditions, and human remains. In this article, we seek to summarize and confront information on the existing finds of skeletons and their inventories that might belong to one of the Anabaptist groups with historical records of their settlements or burial sites directly. Comparison and identification of burial sites are hampered by incompleteness in all sources of records. For some settlements, we have historical records of burials, but we do not have archaeological reports of skeletons found to date. There are sketchy references to skeletons found associated with other sites, but more detailed archaeological reports are not available. The clear identification of skeletal remains as belonging to Anabaptists is challenging due to indistinct and non-specific nature of the funerary practices, the confessional diversity, and the relatively short time of the Anabaptists’ stay in Moravia. The sites mentioned in the article may belong to the Anabaptists, but the certainty established with the help of laboratory methods is currently available only for the burial site in Přibice (Brno-venkov district). The inventory of potential Anabaptist burial sites compiled here can serve as a starting point for verifying the origin of the persons buried there using modern natural science methods - analysis of ancient DNA and isotopes. |
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