03/12/2025 -
Elongated Skulls in Early Medieval Bavaria: DNA, G25 Models, and Their True Origins
Among the most visually striking archaeological finds of early medieval Europe are the
artificially elongated skulls discovered in 5th–6th century Bavarian cemeteries.
For decades, scholars debated whether these women were local Bavarians, “exotic migrants,”
or members of steppe-related groups.
Thanks to the landmark ancient DNA study
(Veeramah et al., 2018)
and the availability of G25 coordinates, we now know the answer with exceptional precision:
these women were not local at all.
1. The Archaeology: Elongated Skulls in Bavaria
Several female burials discovered in southern Germany show cranial deformation, a cultural practice
common among Huns, Gepids, Sarmatians...
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16/11/2025 -
The origins of the early Slavs remain one of the most debated questions in population genetics.
A recent synthesis on The GenArchivist Forum combined dozens of archaeological papers,
hundreds of ancient genomes, and a wide range of cultural contexts. When pieced together,
these data sharply clarify which Y-DNA lineages belong to the core of early Slavs — and which do not.
This article presents the key findings in a clear and accessible format, without sacrificing scientific accuracy.
1. Slavic Ethnogenesis Is an Iron Age Phenomenon — Not Bronze Age
Ancient DNA consistently shows that a distinct Slavic genetic cluster emerges only during the Iron Age and the Migration Period (~200 BCE–600 CE).
Earlier Bronze Age cultures across Poland, Belarus, Ukraine, ...
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15/11/2025 -
From Normandy to Flanders, from southern England to the Netherlands and northern France,
modern people of northwestern Europe form one of the tightest genetic clusters on the continent.
On a PCA plot or with G25-based tools, a French person from Pas-de-Calais can overlap almost
perfectly with someone from Kent, Flanders or Zeeland.
This is not a bug in our calculators. It is the logical result of
the same sequence of population events happening on both sides of the Channel:
Western Hunter-Gatherers, the same Neolithic farmers, the same Bell Beaker expansion, very similar
Iron Age Celtic networks, and then very similar early medieval Germanic migrations.
1. A Shared Mesolithic and Neolithic Foundation
After the Last Glacial Maximum, western Europe was repopulated by a gro...
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10/11/2025 -
From Taiwan to Easter Island: The Genetic Odyssey of the Polynesians
Ancient DNA has transformed our understanding of the greatest oceanic migration in human history. Long before European exploration, Polynesian navigators mastered the Pacific, connecting islands across one-third of the planet. From Taiwan to Rapa Nui (Easter Island), their voyage can now be traced not only through archaeology and language—but through the very genome of their descendants.
1) Taiwan – The Austronesian Homeland (Before 3000 BC)
Modern genomic analyses show that the ancestors of Polynesians originated from the Austronesian-speaking farmers of Taiwan. Populations such as the Amis and Atayal still preserve the closest genetic link to the first voyagers who set sail across the Pacific.
...
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06/11/2025 -
The BAM file is the complete sequence alignment generated by your Big Y test — it contains the raw reads of your Y chromosome. This file is required by third-party services such as YFull for advanced analysis, tree placement and deeper haplogroup discovery. In this tutorial, we’ll walk you through how to request your BAM file on FamilyTreeDNA (FTDNA), generate the download link, and upload it to YFull.
What You Need Before You Start
An FTDNA account with a completed Big Y or Big Y-700 test
A valid email address linked to your kit (you’ll receive the BAM link there)
(Optional) A YFull account ready to receive your BAM upload
Step 1 — Sign In to FamilyTreeDNA
Go to https://www.familytreedna.com/sign-in and log in using the same email you used whe...
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