Fifteen Kurgan skeletons of Central-Asian, Sarmatian, origin (400-200 BC) were investigated. The exceptional preservation conditions in the South-Russian steppe has led to the recovery of DNA in 14 of these 15 individuals. The haplotypes were compared to a database of more than 30,000 modern day individuals (in collaboration with Dr. Peter Forster, Cambridge) and led to the following conclusions:
1. All 14 individuals show differing haplotypes which suggests an unexpectedly heterogeneous gene pool.
2. Most of these haplotypes are rare in modern day populations of the same region.
3. Most of the haplotypes are nowadays found in Europe, the Caucasus or around the Black Sea.
4. Two individuals stem from a Middle-Age burial in the Kurgan and show haplotypes that nowadays are found in Arabic speaking countries.
5. The burial with the highest status –according to grave goods- is female and shows a haplotype that is found in modern day East Asia.
We have been working together with Wolfgang Schier, Norbert Benecke and Hermann Parzinger since September 2008 on a BMBF-project entitled: "Palaeogenetic analyses of economic innovations and social mobility in the Eurasian Steppe 3500-300 BC."
Johannes Gutenberg University
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Joachim Burger,