A study by anthropologists from the German University of Mainz, Johannes Gutenberg University (JGU), and an international team of archaeologists now provides new insights into the origins and genetic structure of prehistoric family communities.

JGU researchers Jens Blöcher and Joachim Burger have analyzed the genomes of skeletons of an extended family from a Bronze Age necropolis in the Russian steppe.

The 3,800-year-old Nepluyevsky burial mound was excavated several years ago and lies on the geographical border between Europe and Asia.

Thanks to genomic statistics, the family and marriage relationships of this society have been deciphered.

The study was carried out in collaboration with archaeologists from Yekaterinburg and Frankfurt and was published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

The kurgan (burial mound) investigated was the grave of six brothers, their wives, children and grandchildren.

The older brother presumably had eight children and two wives, one of whom hailed from the East Asian steppe regions.

The other siblings showed no signs of polygamy and probably lived monogamously with far fewer children.

What the study reveals

“The burial site offers a fascinating snapshot of a prehistoric family,” explains Blöcher, lead author of the study.

“It is notable that the firstborn sibling apparently had a higher status and therefore greater chances of reproduction. The right of the firstborn male seems familiar to us. We know it, for example, in the Old Testament, but also in the aristocracy of historical Europe”.

Genomic data reveals even more. Most of the women buried in the kurgan were immigrants. The sisters of the buried brothers, in turn, found new homes elsewhere.. Burger, lead author of the study, explains:

“The mobility of female marriage is a common pattern that makes sense from an evolutionary and economic perspective. While one sex remains local and ensures continuity of the family line and property, the other marries abroad to prevent inbreeding.”

Consequently, population geneticists in Mainz found that the genomic diversity of prehistoric women was greater than that of men.. Therefore, the women who married into the family came from a wider area and were not related to each other.

In their new homeland, they followed their husbands to the grave. From this the authors conclude that in Nepluyevsky there was both “patrilineality”, that is, the transmission of local traditions through the male line, and “patrilocality”, that is, the place of residence of a family is the place residence of men.

“Archaeology shows that 3,800 years ago, the population of the southern Trans-Urals knew animal husbandry and metallurgy and subsisted mainly on dairy and meat products,” says Svetlana Sharapova, an archaeologist from Yekaterinburg and head of the excavation, adding , “The state of health of the family buried here must have been very poor.. The average life expectancy for women was 28 years, for men 36 years.”

In the last generation, the use of the kurgan stopped suddenly and almost only babies and young children were found. Sharapova adds that “it is possible that the inhabitants have been decimated by disease or that the remaining population has gone elsewhere in search of a better life.”

Similarities around the world

“There is a global connection between different family systems and certain ways of life and economy,” Blöcher.

“However, human societies are characterized by a high degree of flexibility”. He adds that “in Nepluyevsky we find evidence of a pattern of inequality typical of pastoralists: multiple partners and many children for the putative firstborn and no relationships or monogamous relationships for most others.”

The authors find additional genomic evidence that populations genetically similar to the Neplujevsky society lived throughout most of the Eurasian steppe belt.

Burger comments: “It’s quite possible that the local pattern we found is relevant to a much larger area.” Future studies will show to what extent the “Neplujevsky” model can be verified at other Eurasian prehistoric sites.