News Genetics

DNA reveals early mating between Asian herders and European farmers

The finding might rewrite the origins and spread of key cultural innovations and languages

ancient grave

FIRST STEPPES  Yamnaya herders from western Asia, four of whom are buried in this grave, started mating with European farmers hundreds of years before launching a major migration into Europe, new DNA evidence indicates.

A. Kalmykov

By Bruce Bower

- More than 2 years ago

Hundreds of years before changing the genetic face of Bronze Age Europeans, herders based in western Asia’s steppe grasslands were already mingling and occasionally mating with nearby farmers in southeastern Europe.