Within the framework of the Momentum (Lendület) programme of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, the director of our institute, Anna Szécsényi-Nagy's proposal entitled as „Life and Death at the Edge of the Roman Civilization: Complex Bioarchaeological Analysis of Pannonian Communities" has also been awarded a five-year Momentum (Lendület) grant and a new MTA-HUN-REN BTK (HAS-RCH HUN-REN) interdisciplinary research group will be formed in the Institute of Archaeogenomics from December 2023.
The MTA- HUN-REN BTK Lendület Momentum Bioarchaeology Research Group in this project focuses with an interdisciplinary approach on the northeastern region of Roman Pannonia. In this model region, a multi-ethnic and multicultural social environment developed during the Roman rule, in which the relations between foreigners and locals were transformed and revalued again and again over the historical changes. The project proposal is new and complex, in both its questions and working methods. The aim of the research is firstly to reveal and understand the biological composition and the dynamics of change of the Roman era population, also considering the interrelationships of its subgroups and social classes. Secondly, it also examines and collects evidence on the living conditions, life quality and health of the Roman and Romanized inhabitants of the different settlement types (city, castellum and village), through detailed anthropological, genomic and stable isotopic analyses of the residents of Aquincum (Óbuda), Solva (Esztergom) and Páty in coordination with archaeological hypotheses and questions.
Aiming to get to know the life of the people of Pannonia, it also draws on archaeozoological and genetic research on the domesticated animals of high value (such as horses and camels) from many sides, which is leading toward new directions in science and scientific dissemination. The interpretation of the new evidence gained from the biological remains of the burials will serve as a model for understanding processes in other areas of the Empire as well.
