Wealth or Just Job Seekers

th
century as a rich, prosperous, and densely-populated city producing tons
of silver. Such an amount of precious metal could not be mined and processed without an infux of
people from other cities and rural areas and without the contribution of skilled specialists from abroad.
Despite the apparent wealth of the city, its inhabitants (either settled or newly arrived) experienced and
died during mortality crises. Evidence of such events was discovered in the Kutná Hora suburbs, where
the medieval burial ground, including a signifcant component of mass burials, has been unearthed.
In the data derived from pooled catastrophic and non-catastrophic burials (n=1785 individuals),
a notable surplus of males has been identifed with a striking imbalanced adult sex ratio of 149. After considering factors potentially infuencing this value, we suggest that the fgure likely mirrors the original population composition as a consequence of the infow of men migrating to the town for labour/economic opportunities.