A high-status man buried in a wooden boat in northwestern Germany about 1,600 years ago was infected with a rare strain of leprosy never before seen in this part of Europe, researchers reported, according to Live Science. The finding comes from a genomic study of a dozen people buried at Fallward, a coastal settlement that began in the first century B.C. and had become a cemetery by the fifth century A.D. The paper was published online Oct. 15 in iScience.
Among some 200 cremation burials and 60 inhumation burials excavated in the 1990s was a distinctive grave made from an oak boat more than 13 feet (4 meters) long and sealed with a roof-like structure. It held the skeleton of a man who was about 50 years old when he died sometime between A.D. 425 and 450. His grave goods included a small box shaped like a water bird, an ornate chair or throne carved from alder, a bronze basin, and a maple stool with a hunting scene and a runic inscription. He also had a late Roman military belt. "He could, for example, have been a mercenary in the Roman army who later settled between the Elbe and the Weser," co-author Ben Krause-Kyora, an archaeologist at Kiel University's Institute of Clinical Molecular Biology, said in a Nov. 3 statement. The maritime artifacts and his well-developed upper arm bones also suggest he may have worked as a fisherman or boatman late in life.
Genetic analyses found that the man originated in the Danube region, study first author Daniel Myburgh said, and that he was infected with Mycobacterium leprae, the bacterium that causes leprosy. The researchers recovered the bacterial DNA from one of his teeth and a foot bone and were able to identify the strain. It may have evolved in Egypt around the fourth to second centuries B.C. and had never before been found in Central or Northern Europe, according to the statement. His skeleton showed no leprosy lesions. The disease first attacks the nerves and skin and can later damage bones, especially in the nose, jaw, hands, and feet. "Either he was affected by an asymptomatic form of the disease, or the disease had so far only affected soft tissues," co-author Almut Nebel said. "He may have travelled long distances whilst carrying the disease."
The researchers cannot say exactly what happened in his life. He might have been a Roman mercenary who retired to northwest Germany, or he might have acquired the belt through trade, inheritance, or as a war trophy. Either way, they argue, the burial suggests that northwest Germany had long-distance connections in Europe even after the fall of the Roman Empire. The verified results are a rare bacterial strain, a Danube genetic origin, and a richly furnished boat grave, not a full biography of how he was infected.