The onset of urbanisation in the Rhine-Main region 6,000 years ago

Today the Rhine-Main area, encompassing the global economic metropolis of Frankfurt, with the seat of the European Central Bank and Germany’s busiest airport, as well as the two state capitals of Wiesbaden and Mainz, constitutes one of the most important economic hubs in Europe. More than 50 million passengers and more than two million tons of cargo are moved annually via Frankfurt Airport alone. Three million tons were handled in 2014 at the Rhine river port in Mainz, and 335,000 vehicles per day pass through the Frankfurt interchange. The entire Rhine-Main metropolitan area currently has about 4 million inhabitants.

This function as a European hub is essentially determined by its geographical location: in addition to its position at the centre of Europe and the intersection of key transport routes, the Rhine-Main region is located in a favourable climatic zone and has fertile soils.

It is therefore not surprising that the beginnings of urbanisation in western Eurasia were already manifest 6,000 years ago in this region, during a period known as the “Young Neolithic”. At this time, farmers and cattle breeders from the Paris Basin and the Ardennes had settled in the northern Upper Rhine Valley. Their remains are referred to by the archaeological term “Michelsberg culture”, dating from between 4200 and 3500 BC.

During the Young Neolithic the Rhine-Main area was well connected to the west by a complex network: jade axe blades – ultimately stemming from the Western Alps – were exchanged for salt from Hesse and Central Germany. For these early farming communities salt was a sought-after commodity and was much needed in France, where only few inland salt sources exist. Huge settlements such as Schierstein, Glauberg in the Wetterau, and Kapellenberg near Hofheim were built. While the site of Schierstein may have housed up to several thousand inhabitants, the actual number of dwellers at Kapellenberg may not have exceeded one thousand at any given time.

Some high-status burials are known from the beginning of the Michelsberg culture, of which one – a large tumulus similar to those known from Brittany – appears to have been erected at Kapellenberg.

From the Rhine-Main area, the Michelsberg culture spread further east and south. Violence and war played a role in this expansion, with captives taken and perhaps enslaved. Thus, this period not only witnessed the origins of today’s global economy, but also its negative consequences, such as human trafficking and inequality.