Long shared haplotypes identify the southern Urals as a primary source for the 10th-century Hungarians

Abstract

The origins of the Early Medieval Magyars who appeared in the Carpathian Basin by the end of the 9th century CE remain incompletely understood. Previous archaeogenetic research identified the newcomers as migrants from the Eurasian steppe. However, genome-wide ancient DNA from putative source populations has not been available to test alternative theories of their precise source. We generated genome-wide ancient DNA data for 131 individuals from archaeological sites in the Uralic region in Northern Eurasia, which are candidates for the source based on historical, linguistic, and archaeological evidence. Our results tightly link the Magyars to people of the Early Medieval Karayakupovo archaeological horizon on both the European and Asian sides of the southern Urals. The ancestors of the people of the Karayakupovo archaeological horizon were established in the broader Urals by the Late Iron Age and their descendants persisted in the Volga-Kama region until at least the 14th century.