Archaeology, Ethnology & Anthropology of Eurasia 45 (4) 2017   DOI: 10.17746/1563-0110.2017.45.4.132-142

Annotation:  New Data on the Chronology of the Initial Neolithic Gromatukha Culture, Western Amur Region Holocene Fishing in the Big Sea Region of Lake Baikal (Based on Materials from Multilayered Habitati Comparative Characteristics of Stone Tools from the Neolithic Sites on the Upper and Middle Kama On the History of Asian Bosporus in the Early Byzantine Times: Excavations at Verkhnegostagayevskoye The Jomon Megalithic Tradition in Japan: Origins, Features, and Distribution A Morphological Analysis of Malyshevo Middle Neolithic Pottery from the Lower Amur New Absolute Dates for the Trans-Uralian and Western Siberian Neolithic Anthropomorphic Bronze Masks from the Timiryazevo-1 Burial Ground A Multidisciplinary Study of Burial Mounds and a Reconstruction of the Climate of the Turan-Uyuk De Classifi cation of 9th–13th Century Arrowheads Found in Azerbaijan Chinese Lacquerware from the Pazyryk Burial Ground Chineta II, Altai A Late 16th to Early 17th Century Mongolian Ceremonial Helmet from the Moscow Kremlin Armoury Dendrochronological Methods in the Architectural and Ethnographic Study of Russian Towns in Siberia Kinship Analysis of Human Remains from the Sargat Mounds, Baraba Forest-Steppe, Western Siberia Intragroup Variation of the Facial Skeleton in 16th–19th Century Rural Russian Populations in the W   

Kinship Analysis of Human Remains from the Sargat Mounds,
Baraba Forest-Steppe, Western Siberia

A.S. Pilipenko^1–3, S.V. Cherdantsev^{1, 2}, R.O. Trapezov^{1, 2}, V.I. Molodin^{2, 3}, L.S. Kobeleva², D.V. Pozdnyakov²,
and N.V. Polosmak²

¹Institute of Cytology and Genetics, Siberian Branch, Russian Academy of Sciences, Pr. Akademika Lavrentieva 10, Novosibirsk, 630090, Russia

²Institute of Archaeology and Ethnography, Siberian Branch, Russian Academy of Sciences, Pr. Akademika Lavrentieva 17, Novosibirsk, 630090, Russia

³Novosibirsk State University, Pirogova 1, Novosibirsk, 630090, Russia

We present the results of a paleogenetic analysis of nine individuals from two Early Iron Age mounds in the Baraba forest-steppe, associated with the Sargat culture (five from Pogorelka-2, mound 8, and four from Vengerovo-6, mound 1). Four sys tems of genetic markers were analyzed: mitochondrial DNA, the polymorphic part of the amel ogenin gene, the auto somal STR-loci, and the STR-loci of the Y-chromosome. Complete or partial data, obtained for eight of the nine individuals, were subjected to kinship analysis. No direct relatives of the “parent-child” type were detected. However, the data indicate close paternal and maternal kinship among certain individuals. This was evidently one of the reasons why certain individuals were buried in a single mound. Paternal kinship appears to have been of greater importance. The diversity of mtDNA and Y-chromosome lineages among individuals from one and the same mound suggests that kinship was not the only motive behind burying the deceased people jointly. The presence of very similar, though not identical, variants of the Y-chromosome in different burial grounds may indicate the existence of groups such as clans, consisting of paternally related males. Our conclusions need further confirmation and detailed elaboration.

Keywords: Paleogenetics, ancient DNA, kinship analysis, mitochondrial DNA, uniparental genetic markers, STRloci, Y-chromosome, Baraba forest-steppe, Sargat culture, Early Iron Age