This article is about the Iron Age cultures on the Eurasian Steppe. For the Iranian people of the Pontic steppe, seeScythians. For other uses, seeScythian (disambiguation).
The Scythian-Siberian world was characterized by theScythian triad, which are similar, yet not identical, styles of weapons, horses' bridles, andjewelry and decorative art. The question of how related these cultures were is disputed among scholars. Its peoples were of diverse origins, and included not justScythians, from which the cultures are named, but other peoples as well, such as theCimmerians,Massagetae,Saka,Sarmatians, and obscureforest-steppe populations. Mostly speakers of theScythian branch of theIranian languages,[b] all of these peoples are sometimes collectively referred to asScythians,Scytho-Siberians,Early Nomads, orIron Age Nomads.[3]
Excavations atArzhan inTuva,Russia have uncovered the earliest Scythian-stylekurgan yet found.[7] Similarly the earliest examples of theanimal style art which would later characterize the Scytho-Siberian cultures have been found near the upperYenisei River andNorth China, dating to the 10th century BC. Based on these finds, it has been suggested that the Scytho-Siberian world emerged at an early period in southernSiberia.[5] It is probably in this area that the Scythian way of life initially developed.[2][8] Recent genetic studies have concluded that the Scythians formed from European-related groups of theYamnaya culture andEast Asian/Siberian groups during theBronze Age and earlyIron Age.[9][10][5][11]
The Scytho-Siberian world quickly came to stretch from thePannonian Basin in the west to theAltai Mountains in the east.[12] There were, however, significant cultural differences between east and west.[10] Over time they came in contact with other ancient civilizations, such asAssyria,Greece andPersia. In the late 1st millennium BC, peoples belonging to the Scytho-Siberian world expanded into Iran (Sakastan),India (Indo-Scythians) and theTarim Basin.[13] In the early centuries AD the western part of the Scytho-Siberian world came under pressure from theGoths and otherGermanic peoples.[13] The end of the Scythian period in archaeology has been set at approximately the 2nd century AD.[2]
Recent archeological and genetic data confirmed that Western and Eastern Scythians of the 1st-millennium BC originated independently, but both formed from a combination of aYamnaya-related ancestry component from the area of theEuropean steppes,[14] and anEast Asian-related component most closely corresponding to the modern North SiberianNganasan people of the lowerYenesei.[14] Furthermore, archaeological evidence now tends to suggest that the origins of the Scytho-Siberian world, characterized by itskurgan burial mounds and itsAnimal style of the 1st-millennium BC, are to be found among Eastern Scythians rather than their Western counterparts: easternkurgans are older than western ones (such as the Altaic kurganArzhan 1 inTuva), and elements of theAnimal style are first attested in areas of theYenisei river and modern-day China in the 10th century BC.[15] The rapid spread of the Scytho-Siberian world, from the Eastern Scythians to the Western Scythians, is also confirmed by significant east-to-west gene flow across the steppes during the 1st millennium BC.[14][15]
Depiction of aSarmatian from a Romansarcophagus, 2nd century AD. Although a different people than theScythians, the Sarmatians were part of the Scytho-Siberian world.[5]
The peoples of the Scytho-Siberian world are mentioned by contemporaryPersian andGreek historians. They were mostly speakers ofIranian languages.[b] Despite belonging to similar material cultures, the peoples of the Scytho-Siberian world belonged to many separate ethnic groups.[16][17] Peoples associated with the Scytho-Siberian world include speakers of theScythian languages:[5][18]
Although the peoples of the forest steppe were part of the Scytho-Siberian world, their origins are obscure;[18] there might have beenearly Slavs,Balts, andFinno-Ugric peoples among them.[20][21] The settled population of the Scytho-Siberian world areas also includedThracians.[9]
Among the diverse peoples of the Scytho-Siberian world, the Scythians are the most famous, due to the reports on them published by the 5th century Greek historianHerodotus. The ancient Persians referred to all nomads of steppe asSaka. In modern times, the termScythians is sometimes applied to all the peoples associated with the Scytho-Siberian world.[20] Within this terminology it is often distinguished between "western" Scythians living on the Pontic–Caspian steppe, and "eastern" Scythians living on theEastern Steppe.[5][13] The termScytho-Siberians has also been applied to all peoples associated with the Scytho-Siberian world.[25] The termsEarly Nomads[26] andIron Age Nomads have also been used.[10] The termsSaka orSauromates, andScytho-Siberians, is sometimes used for the "eastern" Scythians living inCentral Asia and southern Siberia respectively.[9][27]
The ambiguity of the termScythian has led to a lot of confusion in literature.[c][18]
Nicola Di Cosmo (1999) questions the validity of referring to the cultures of all early Eurasian nomads as "Scythian", and recommends the use of alternative terms such asEarly Nomadic.[29][d]
By ancient authors, the term "Scythian" eventually came to be applied to a wide range of peoples "who had no relation whatever to the original Scythians", such as theHuns, Goths,Turks,Avars,Khazars, and other unnamed nomads.[13]
Horse attacked by tiger,Ordos culture, 4th–1st century BC. The cultures of the Scytho-Siberian world are characteristic for theirart, which was made in theanimal style.
The cultures of the Scytho-Siberian world are recognized for three characteristics known as theScythian triad:[18][27]
similar, yet not identical, shapes for horses' bridles,
In the beginning of the 18th century,Russian explorers began uncovering Scythian finds throughout their newly acquired territories.
Significant Scythian archaeological finds have been uncovered up to recent times. A major find are thePazyryk burials, which were discovered on theUkok Plateau in the 1940s. The finds are revealed the form ofmummification practiced by the Scythians.[2] Another important find is theIssyk kurgan.[8]
The Scythians were excellent craftsmen with complex cultural traditions.Horse sacrifices are common in Scythian graves, and several of the sacrificed horses were evidently old and well-kept, indicating that the horse played a prominent role in Scythian society.[2] They played a prominent role in the network connecting ancient civilizations known as theSilk Road.[13] The homogeneity of patrilineal lineages and contrasting diversity of matrilineal lineages of samples from Scythian burial sites indicate that Scythian society was stronglypatriarchal.[27]
Numerous archaeological finds have revealed that the Scythians led a warlike life: Their competition for territory must have been fierce. The numerous weapons placed in graves are indicative of a highly militarized society. Scythian warfare was primarily conducted throughmounted archery. They were the first great power to perfect this tactic. The Scythians developed a new, powerful type of bow known as theScythian bow. Sometimes they would poison their arrows.[2]
The Scythians were tall and powerfully built, even by modern standards.[e] Skeletons of Scythian elites differ from those of modern people by their longer arms and legs, and stronger bone formation. Commoners were shorter, averaging 10–15 cm (3.9–5.9 in) shorter than the elite.[31][better source needed]
Their physical traits are characteristic ofIranian peoples and support a common origin indicated by the linguistic evidence, however, people of mixed physical appearance are also indicated by the archaeological and historical evidence.[e][31][better source needed]
Numerous Eastern Scythian remains have been found in an excellent state of preservation in theAltai mountains, with soft tissues such as skin and hair preserved.[32] From the Pazyryk valley, Scythian remains show a variety of hair colors, ranging from black to bright chestnut.[33] Mummified Scythian warriors from theUkok plateau andMongolia had blond hair.[34][35]
Preserved skin tissue also reveals that the eastern Scythians hadtattoos. Tattooing is not thought to have been practiced by western Scythians.[36]
The genetics of remains fromScythian-identified cultures show broad general patterns, among these are remarkably different histories for men and women.
The Western Scythians had haplogroups such as R1a, R1b, E1b, I2a, Q1a and J2a, and the Eastern Scythians had R1a, N and Q1a.[37][38][39][27][10][5][4]
The maternal lineages among Scythians are diverse,[5][10][27] showing a mixture of Eastern and West Eurasian lineages, with increasing East Asian mixture in the Iron Age.[9][40] In Western Scythians, West Eurasian maternal lineages are 62.5–82% of the total, while East Eurasian maternal lineages are 18–37.5%.[9][41] In a sample of Eastern Scythians from Tuva, the maternal lineages are nearly equally divided between Western and East Eurasian sources.[27] The East Eurasian maternal lineages were likely brought by individuals sharing affinities with modern-dayNganasan people, as well as the ancientOkunev culture.[42]
The Scythians represent a "multitude of horse-warrior nomad" groups, which emerged fromBronze andIron Age Central Asians (Western Steppe Herders or "Steppe_MLBA") who mixed with an East Asian-derived population represented byKhövsgöl LBA groups, giving rise to the various "Scythian cultures".[43] Different Scythian groups arose locally, rather than through migration patterns.[44][45] As a whole, Scythians can be modeled as a mixture between West Eurasian sources, primarily Western Steppe Herders andBMAC-like groups, with additional amounts of mixture from a population represented by the Khövsgöl LBA peoples of East Eurasian origin. Previous suggested mixture sources represented by other modern "East Eurasian proxies", such asHan Chinese orNganasans, failed and were less reliable than Khövsgöl sources.[46] Scythians can broadly be differentiated into "Western" and "Eastern" sub-groups, with Western Scythians displaying affinity to various modern groups in the Caucasus and Central Asia, while Eastern Scythian affinity is more widespread but nearly exclusively found among modernTurkic-speaking as well asUralic andPaleosiberian peoples.[47][9][48][49] Overall, modernTajiks andYaghnobis were found to display the strongest genetic continuity with the Bronze and Iron Age populations of Central Asia (Indo-Iranians).[50][51] Scythian Steppe populations display genetic heterogeneity along a west-to-east cline, with Eastern Scythians having higher genetic diversity.[6] Eastern Scythians around theAltai Mountains were of multiple origins and originated from a mixture event in theBronze Age. The Eastern Scythians genetically formed from mixture between Western Steppe Herder sources (which could be associated with different cultures such as Sintashta, Srubnaya, and Andronovo) and a specific East Eurasian source that was already present during the LBA in the neighboring northernMongolia region.[52] Eastern Scythians did not belong to a single genetic or cultural cluster, while Western Scythians fall in or close to the European cluster.[53]
A later different Eastern influx, starting during the Middle Iron Age to post-Iron Age period, is evident in three outlier samples of theTasmola culture (Tasmola Birlik) and one of thePazyryk culture (Pazyryk Berel), which displayed c. 70–83% additionalAncient Northeast Asian ancestry represented by the NeolithicDevil's Gate Cave specimen, suggesting them to be recent migrants from further east. The same additional eastern ancestry is found among the later groups of Huns (Hun Berel 300CE, Hun elite 350CE), and the Karakaba remains (830CE). At the same time, westernSarmatian-like and minor additional BMAC-like ancestry spread eastwards, with a Saka-associated sample from southeasternKazakhstan (Konyr Tobe 300CE) displaying around 85% Sarmatian and 15% BMAC ancestry. Sarmatians are modeled to derive primarily from the preceding Western Steppe Herders of thePontic–Caspian steppe.[11]
Initially, the Western Scythians carried only West Eurasianmaternal haplogroups, but the frequency of East Eurasian haplogroups rises to 18–26% in samples dated from the 6th-2nd centuries BC.[41] Among the Western Scythians discovered atRostov-on-Don, inEuropean Russia, East Eurasian maternal haplogroups make up 37.5% of the total. These results possibly suggest the increasing presence of East Eurasian women in Western Scythian populations, althoughautosomal genetic evidence is needed to confirm this observation.[54]
In terms ofpaternal haplogroups, most Western Scythian remains from the North Pontic region have been observed to carry a specific cladehaplogroup R1a, as well as Q1a, R1b, I2a, J2a and E1b.[4][37][39]
Unterländer and others (2017) found that contemporary descendants of western Scythian groups are found among various groups in the Caucasus and Central Asia.[47]
Andreeva, et al. (2025) determined the paternal haplogroups of 36 Scythian males of the area stretching from the northernBlack Sea coast to theMiddle Don, dated the 7th century BC to the 1st century AD. 58.4% of the haplogroups belonged to varieties ofhaplogroup R1a (Y2631, Y934 and R-Y2) andR1b (R-Z2106). On the other hand, 22.2% belonged tohaplogroup I2a (I-L801 and I-L702). The remaining individuals carriedhaplogroup G2a (G-S9409),J2a1 (J-Y26650 and J-FT72594),N1a (N-Z1934), andQ1a (Q-L940). Among present-day Europeans, Scythians shared the highest levels of alleles with modern Eastern Baltic (Lithuanian,Estonian) and NorthwesternRussian populations. Similarly, the Scythian maternal haplogroups are mostly found in modern carriers from Europe, predominantly inPoland,Denmark, and thenorthwestern part of Russia.[55]
Most of the Scythians were predicted to have brown orblond hair, with a notable proportion ofblue-eyed individuals. Several Scythians hadMC1R gene variants associated withred hair,freckles, and skin, with a tendency tosunburn.[55]
Keyseret al. in 2009 studied the haplotypes and haplogroups of 26 ancient human specimens from theKrasnoyarsk area inSiberia dated from between the middle of the 2nd millennium BC and the 4th century AD (Scythian andSarmatian timeframe). Nearly all subjects belonged tohaplogroup R-M17. The authors suggest that their data shows that between the Bronze and the Iron Ages the constellation of populations known variously as Scythians,Andronovians, etc. were blue- (or green-) eyed, fair-skinned and light-haired people who might have played a role in the early development of theTarim Basin civilisation. Moreover, this study found that they were genetically more closely related to modern populations in eastern Europe than those of central and southern Asia.[56]
Pilipenko (2018)[57] studiedmtDNA from remains of theTagar culture, which was part of the Scytho-Siberian world. Although found inKhakassia, at the eastern extreme of the Eurasian steppe, remains from the early stage of the Tagar culture were found to be closely related to those of contemporary Scythians on thePontic-Caspian steppe far to the west, exhibiting both West Eurasian and East Eurasian lineages. However, the fossils from the middle stage of the Tagar culture showed a strong increase in East Eurasian maternal lineages, increasing from 35% to nearly 45% by the middle stage.[58] ThemtDNA haplogroupsC andD increased from 8.7 to 37.8%.[59]
Mary, et al. (2019)[27] studied the genetics of remains from theAldy-Bel culture in and aroundTuva in central Asia, adjacent to westernMongolia; theAldy-Bel culture is considered one of the Scytho-Siberian cultures. The authors also analyzed thematernal haplogroups of 26 Siberian Scythian remains fromArzhan. 50% of the remains carried an East Eurasian haplogroup, while 50% carried a West Eurasian haplogroup. In contrast to the paternal lineages, the maternal lineages were extremely diverse. The most common lineages were variants ofhaplogroup C4.[60]
The Scythian groups of the Pontic Steppe and South Siberia had significantly different paternal genetics, which suggests that the Pontic and South Siberian Scythians had completely different paternal origins, with almost no paternal gene flow between them.[27][f]
Since the Middle Iron Age onwards, the Eastern Scythians received additional Northern East Asian geneflow, paralleling the emergence ofHuns, which shared this newly arrived component. There was also an increase in Sarmatian and BMAC-like ancestries.[11]
Unterländer, et al. (2017) found that eastern Scythians share closest genetic similarities with modern-day speakers ofSiberian Turkic languages, such asTelengits,Tubalars, andTofalars, which supports a "multi-regional origin" of the eastern Iron Age Scythians.[62] Eastern Scythians share partial ancestry with contemporaryTurkic, Mongolian, and Siberian groups in eastern Eurasia, while evidence of genetic affinity with Scythians is strongest among modern speakers of theKipchak languages.[63] There is increasing evidence for a partial continuity from the eastern Scythians to theTurkic-speakers of the Altai region, as well as modernUralic andPaleosiberian peoples.[64][49] Turkic-speaking Central Asians can be described as having formed from mixture between Scythian-like groups, displaying their highest genetic affinity to modern dayTajiks, and "Eastern SteppeXiongnu" groups during the Iron Age.[65] The mixture with West Eurasian sources was found to be "in accordance with the linguistically documented language borrowing in Turkic languages".[66]
^Also referred to as theScytho-Siberian world,[1]Scythic cultures,Scytho-Siberian cultures,Early Nomadic cultures, theScythian civilization, theScythian horizon, theScythian world, or theScythian continuum.
^ab"[A] nomadic people made up of many different tribes thrived across a vast region that stretched from the borders of northern China and Mongolia, through southern Siberia and northern Kazakhstan, as far as the northern reaches of the Black Sea. Collectively they were known by their Greek name: the Scythians. They spoke Iranian languages ..."[2]
^"The Achaemenids called the Scythians 'Saka' which sometimes leads to confusion in the literature. The term 'Scythians' is particularly used for the representatives of this culture who lived in the European part of the steppe zone. Those who lived in Central Asia are often called Sauromates or Saka and in the Altai area, they are generally known as Scytho-Siberians."[28]
^"Even though there were fundamental ways in which nomadic groups over such a vast territory differed, the terms 'Scythian' and 'Scythic' have been widely adopted to describe a special phase that followed the widespread diffusion of mounted nomadism, characterized by the presence of special weapons, horse gear, and animal art in the form of metal plaques. Archaeologists have used the term 'Scythic continuum' in a broad cultural sense to indicate the early nomadic cultures of the Eurasian steppe. The term 'Scythic' draws attention to the fact that there are elements – shapes of weapons, vessels, and ornaments, as well as lifestyle – common to both the eastern and western ends of the Eurasian steppe region. However, the extension and variety of sites across Asia makes Scythian and Scythic terms too broad to be viable, and the more neutral 'early nomadic' is preferable, since the cultures of the Northern Zone cannot be directly associated with either the historical Scythians or any specific archaeological culture defined as Saka or Scytho-Siberian."[29]
^ab"[T]he [elite] Scythians were relatively tall. This tallness is particularly noticeable in warrior burials and those of men of the upper social stratum, who would seem tall even today ... [T]hese skeletons differ from those of today in their longer arm and leg bones and a generally stronger bone formation ... The physical characteristics of the Scythians correspond to their cultural affiliation: [T]heir origins place them within the group of Iranian peoples ... [W]e are dealing with a period in which huge areas of Siberia far into Mongolia were still inhabited by ancient Europoids."[30]
^"The absence ofR1b lineages in the Scytho-Siberian individuals tested so far and their presence in the North Pontic Scythians suggest that these two groups had a completely different paternal lineage makeup with nearly no gene flow from male carriers between them."[27]
^Unterländer 2017. Genomic inference reveals that Scythians in the east and the west of the steppe zone can best be described as a mixture of Yamnaya-related ancestry and an East Asian component. Demographic modelling suggests independent origins for eastern and western groups with ongoing gene-flow between them, plausibly explaining the striking uniformity of their material culture. We also find evidence that significant gene-flow from east to west Eurasia must have occurred early during the Iron Age. The origin of the widespread Scythian-Siberian cultures has long been debated in Eurasian archaeology. The northern Black Sea steppe was originally considered the homeland and centre of the Scythians3 until Terenozhkin formulated the hypothesis of a Central Asian origin4. On the other hand, evidence supporting an east Eurasian origin includes the kurgan Arzhan 1 in Tuva5, which is considered the earliest Scythian kurgan5. Dating of additional burial sites situated in east and west Eurasia confirmed eastern kurgans as older than their western counterparts6,7. Additionally, elements of the characteristic 'Animal Style' dated to the tenth century BCE1,4 were found in the region of the Yenisei river and modern-day China, supporting the early presence and origin of Scythian culture in the East.
^abKrzewińska 2018. The nomadic populations were heterogeneous and carried genetic affinities with populations from several other regions including the Far East and the southern Urals. Genetic analyses of maternal lineages of Scythians suggest a mixed origin and an east-west admixture gradient across the Eurasian steppe (10–12). The genomics of two early Scythian Aldy-Bel individuals (13) showed genetic affinities to eastern Asian populations (12).
^abcGnecchi-Ruscone, Guido Alberto; Khussainova, Elmira; Kahbatkyzy, Nurzhibek; Musralina, Lyazzat; Spyrou, Maria A.; Bianco, Raffaela A.; Radzeviciute, Rita; Martins, Nuno Filipe Gomes; Freund, Caecilia; Iksan, Olzhas; Garshin, Alexander (March 2021)."Ancient genomic time transect from the Central Asian Steppe unravels the history of the Scythians".Science Advances.7 (13) eabe4414.Bibcode:2021SciA....7.4414G.doi:10.1126/sciadv.abe4414.PMC7997506.PMID33771866.Our findings shed new light onto the debate about the origins of the Scythian cultures. We do not find support for a western Pontic-Caspian steppe origin, which is, in fact, highly questioned by more recent historical/archeological work (1, 2). The Kazakh Steppe origin hypothesis finds instead a better correspondence with our results, but rather than finding support for one of the two extreme hypotheses, i.e., single origin with population diffusion versus multiple independent origins with only cultural transmission, we found evidence for at least two independent origins as well as population diffusion and admixture (Fig. 4B). In particular, the eastern groups are consistent with descending from a gene pool that formed as a result of a mixture between preceding local steppe_MLBA sources (which could be associated with different cultures such as Sintashta, Srubnaya, and Andronovo that are genetically homogeneous) and a specific eastern Eurasian source that was already present during the LBA in the neighboring northern Mongolia region (27).
^abcUnterländer 2017."Genomic inference reveals that Scythians in the east and the west of the steppe zone can best be described as a mixture of Yamnaya-related ancestry and an East Asian component. Demographic modelling suggests independent origins for eastern and western groups with ongoing gene-flow between them, plausibly explaining the striking uniformity of their material culture. We also find evidence that significant gene-flow from east to west Eurasia must have occurred early during the Iron Age." and "The blend of EHG [European hunter-gatherer] and Caucasian elements in carriers of the Yamnaya culture was formed on the European steppe and exported into Central Asia and Siberia"
^abUnterländer 2017. "The origin of the widespread Scythian culture has long been debated in Eurasian archaeology. The northern Black Sea steppe was originally considered the homeland and centre of the Scythians until Terenozhkin formulated the hypothesis of a Central Asian origin. On the other hand, evidence supporting an east Eurasian origin includes the kurgan Arzhan 1 in Tuva, which is considered the earliest Scythian kurgan. Dating of additional burial sites situated in east and west Eurasia confirmed eastern kurgans as older than their western counterparts. Additionally, elements of the characteristic 'Animal Style' dated to the tenth century BC were found in the region of the Yenisei river and modern-day China, supporting the early presence of Scythian culture in the East."
^Argent, Gala (2011)."2".At Home, with the Good Horses: Relationality, Roles, Identity and Ideology in Iron Age Inner Asia (PhD). University of Leicester. Retrieved1 January 2023.
^Argent 2011, p. 43: "Rudenko also noted that men's hair varied among shaved, bright chestnut, dark blond and soft, black and curly..."
^Argent 2011, p. 38: "Second, also on the Ukok plateau, is the cemetery of Verh-Kaldzhin, where a blond man nicknamed the "warrior" was buried with one horse (Verh-Kaldzhin 2-1)."
^abUnterländer 2017, p. 4: "The eastern Scythians display nearly equal proportions of mtDNA lineages common in east and west Eurasia, whereas in the western Scythian groups, the frequency of lineages now common in east Eurasia is generally lower, even reaching zero in four samples of the initial Scythian phase of the eight to sixth century BCE (group #1 in Fig. 2), and reaches 18–26% during later periods (sixth to second century BCE; #2 and #3) (Supplementary Table 7)."
^Järve, Mari; Saag, Lehti; Scheib, Christiana Lyn; Pathak, Ajai K.; Montinaro, Francesco; Pagani, Luca; Flores, Rodrigo; Guellil, Meriam; Saag, Lauri; Tambets, Kristiina; Kushniarevich, Alena; Solnik, Anu; Varul, Liivi; Zadnikov, Stanislav; Petrauskas, Oleg (22 July 2019)."Shifts in the Genetic Landscape of the Western Eurasian Steppe Associated with the Beginning and End of the Scythian Dominance".Current Biology.29 (14): 2430–2441.e10.Bibcode:2019CBio...29E2430J.doi:10.1016/j.cub.2019.06.019.ISSN0960-9822.PMID31303491.Recently, studies of ancient Scythian genomes have affirmed the confederate nature of the Scythian tribes, showing them to be genetically distinct from one another but finding little or no support for large-scale east-to-west movements, instead generally suggesting separate local origins of various Scythian groups [1, 2, 3].
^Järve 2019. "The Early Iron Age nomadic Scythians have been described as a confederation of tribes of different origins, based on ancient DNA evidence [1, 2, 3]. All samples of this study also possessed at least one additional eastern component, one of which was nearly at 100% in modern Nganasans (orange) and the other in modern Han Chinese (yellow; Figure S2). The eastern components were present in variable proportions in the samples of this study."
^Gnecchi-Ruscone, Guido Alberto; Khussainova, Elmira; Kahbatkyzy, Nurzhibek; Musralina, Lyazzat; Spyrou, Maria A.; Bianco, Raffaela A.; Radzeviciute, Rita; Martins, Nuno Filipe Gomes; Freund, Caecilia; Iksan, Olzhas; Garshin, Alexander; Zhaniyazov, Zhassulan; Bekmanov, Bakhytzhan; Kitov, Egor; Samashev, Zainolla (26 March 2021)."Ancient genomic time transect from the Central Asian Steppe unravels the history of the Scythians".Science Advances.7 (13) eabe4414.Bibcode:2021SciA....7.4414G.doi:10.1126/sciadv.abe4414.ISSN2375-2548.PMC7997506.PMID33771866.Genetic ancestry modeling of the IA groups performed with qpWave and qpAdm confirmed that the steppe_MLBA groups adequately approximate the western Eurasian ancestry source in IA Scythians while the preceding steppe_EBA (e.g., Yamnaya and Afanasievo) do not (data file S4). As an eastern Eurasian proxy, we chose LBA herders from Khovsgol in northern Mongolia based on their geographic and temporal proximity. Other eastern proxies fail the model because of a lack or an excess of affinity toward the Ancient North Eurasian (ANE) lineage (25).
^abUnterländer 2017: "Contemporary descendants of western Scythian groups are found among various groups in the Caucasus and Central Asia, while similarities to eastern Scythian are found to be more widespread, but almost exclusively among Turkic language speaking (formerly) nomadic groups, particularly from the Kipchak branch of Turkic languages."
^Krzewińska 2018: "The results point to the presence of a deep shared ancestry of all Iron Age nomadic groups associated with Bronze Age populations of the steppe, which, however, is not equivalent with a direct genetic continuity between Srubnaya-Alakulskaya and the western Scythians."
^Gnecchi-Ruscone, Guido Alberto; Khussainova, Elmira; Kahbatkyzy, Nurzhibek; Musralina, Lyazzat; Spyrou, Maria A.; Bianco, Raffaela A.; Radzeviciute, Rita; Martins, Nuno Filipe Gomes; Freund, Caecilia; Iksan, Olzhas; Garshin, Alexander (March 2021)."Ancient genomic time transect from the Central Asian Steppe unravels the history of the Scythians".Science Advances.7 (13) eabe4414.Bibcode:2021SciA....7.4414G.doi:10.1126/sciadv.abe4414.PMC7997506.PMID33771866.Our findings shed new light onto the debate about the origins of the Scythian cultures. We do not find support for a western Pontic-Caspian steppe origin, which is, in fact, highly questioned by more recent historical/archeological work (1, 2). The Kazakh Steppe origin hypothesis finds instead a better correspondence with our results, but rather than finding support for one of the two extreme hypotheses, i.e., single origin with population diffusion versus multiple independent origins with only cultural transmission, we found evidence for at least two independent origins as well as population diffusion and admixture (Fig. 4B). In particular, the eastern groups are consistent with descending from a gene pool that formed as a result of a mixture between preceding local steppe_MLBA sources (which could be associated with different cultures such as Sintashta, Srubnaya, and Andronovo that are genetically homogeneous) and a specific eastern Eurasian source that was already present during the LBA in the neighboring northern Mongolia region (27).
^Juras 2017, p. 8/10: "Mitochondrial haplogroup analyses of the NPR Scythians from this study and those from Rostov-on-Don and Pazyryks from Altai and Inner Mongolia, reveal that, for the most part, the same lineages are found in all three groups and are often singularly represented in each group. Noteworthy, comparing the frequencies of east and west Eurasian haplogroups in all three groups of the Scythian horizon, an east-west mtDNA lineage cline is visible, for east Eurasian lineages going west-east is from 26.3% (in present study) through 37.5% (in Scythians from Rostov-on-Don) to 46.7% (in Pazyryks) with the opposite trend for west Eurasian lineages." [...] "The genetic influx of East Eurasian haplotypes might be the result of establishing relationships between migrants with European ancestry and women of east Eurasian origin as was previously proposed by66 in case of Iron Age south Siberian populations. However, more detailed studies of autosomal DNA are needed to clearly resolve this issue."
^abAndreeva, Tatiana V.; Soshkina, Anna D.; Gusev, Fedor E.; Malyarchuk, Alexandra B.; Dotsenko, Gleb S.; Dudko, Natalia A.; Plotnikova, Maria Yu.; Kunizheva, Svetlana S.; Manakhov, Andrey D.; Ustkachkintseva, Tatiana V.; Protasova, Maria S.; Volodin, Semyon A.; Buzhilova, Alexandra P.; Razuvaev, Yuriy D.; Berezina, Natalia Ya. (23 July 2025)."Genetic history of Scythia".Science Advances.11 (30) eads8179.Bibcode:2025SciA...11S8179A.doi:10.1126/sciadv.ads8179.PMC12285711.PMID40700493.
^Pilipenko et al. 2018: "We observed differences in the mtDNA pool structure between the Early and the Middle chronological stages of the Tagar culture population, as evidenced by the change in the ratio of Western to Eastern Eurasian mtDNA components. The contribution of Eastern Eurasian lineages increased from about one-third (34.8%) in the Early Tagar group to almost one-half (45.8%) in the Middle Tagar group."
^Pilipenko et al. 2018: "According to the results of Unterlander et al. [4], East Eurasian mtDNA components in the Western Eurasian steppe belt increased during the Early Iron Age .... The observed reduction in the genetic distance between the Middle Tagar population and other Scythian-like populations of Southern Siberia (Fig 5; S4 Table), in our opinion, is primarily associated with an increase in the role of East Eurasian mtDNA lineages in the gene pool (up to nearly half of the gene pool) and a substantial increase in the joint frequency of haplogroups C and D (from 8.7% in the Early Tagar series to 37.5% in the Middle Tagar series)."
^Unterländer 2017, p. 69: "Thirdly, contemporary populations with the highest likelihood of being directly descended from eastern Scythian groups are almost exclusively Turkic language speakers (Supplementary Fig. 10b). Particularly high statistical support was documented for some Turkic speaking groups geographically located close to the archaeological sites of the eastern Scythians (e.g. Telenghits, Tubular, Tofalar), but also among Turkic speaking populations located in Central Asia (e.g. Kyrgyz, Kazakhs and Karakalpaks) (Supplementary Fig. 11). These same results were found for some Turkic groups located even further to the West, such as the Kazan Volga-Tatars. Finally, contemporary populations likely to share a common ancestor with eastern Scythians were mainly found among Turkic, Mongolian and Siberian groups located in eastern Eurasia (Supplementary Fig. 10d and Supplementary Fig. 11). In summary, these results provide further support for a multi-regional origin of the various Scythian groups from the Iron Age."
^Unterländer 2017: "Contemporary descendants of western Scythian groups are found among various groups in the Caucasus and Central Asia, while similarities to eastern Scythian are found to be more widespread, but almost exclusively among Turkic language speaking (formerly) nomadic groups, particularly from the Kipchak branch of Turkic languages (Supplementary Note 1)."
^Tikhonov, Dmitrii; Gurkan, Cemal; Peler, Gökçe; Dyakonov, Viktor (2019)."On The Genetic Continuity of the Iron Age Pazyryk Culture: Geographic Distributions of the Paternal and Maternal Lineages from the Ak-Alakha-1 Burial".International Journal of Human Genetics.19 (1).doi:10.31901/24566330.2019/19.01.709.S2CID202015095. "The substantial presence of the Ak-Alakha-1 mtDNA and Y-STR haplotypes in the contemporary Anatolian populations may be attributed to two major historical events: (a) the less likely being the Scythian invasion of Anatolia around 7th century BCE and settlement for around 30 years near the Aras or Araxes River (Herodotus 1920), and (b) the more likely being the Central Asiatic Turkic migrations into Anatolia from around 11th century CE onwards, keeping in mind the ever growing support for a strong genetic continuity between the ancient eastern Scythians and the proto-Turkic tribes (Unterlander et al. 2017)."
^Dai, Shan-Shan; Sulaiman, Xierzhatijiang; Isakova, Jainagul; Xu, Wei-Fang; Abdulloevich, Najmudinov Tojiddin; Afanasevna, Manilova Elena; Ibrohimovich, Khudoidodov Behruz; Chen, Xi; Yang, Wei-Kang; Wang, Ming-Shan; Shen, Quan-Kuan; Yang, Xing-Yan; Yao, Yong-Gang; Aldashev, Almaz A; Saidov, Abdusattor (25 August 2022)."The Genetic Echo of the Tarim Mummies in Modern Central Asians".Molecular Biology and Evolution.39 (9) msac179.doi:10.1093/molbev/msac179.ISSN0737-4038.PMC9469894.PMID36006373.Given the Steppe-related ancestry (e.g., Andronovo) existing in Scythians (i.e., Saka; Unterländer et al. 2017; Damgaard et al. 2018; Guarino-Vignon et al. 2022), the proposed linguistic and physical anthropological links between the Tajiks and Scythians (Han 1993; Kuz′mina and Mallory 2007) may be ascribed to their shared Steppe-related ancestry. By contrast, the Kyrgyz, together with other Turkic-speaking populations, originated from the admixture since the Iron Age.
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