Ancient DNA Yields Clues to the Puzzle of European Origins

摘要

In 2000, archaeologists uncovered a well-preserved male skeleton at an early farming site at Halberstadt, northwest of Leipzig, Germany. The skeleton was lying on its left side, its legs and arms tightly flexed, with three pottery bowls buried with it. The man had belonged to a central European culture called the Linearbandkeramik (LBK), characterized by large longhouses and distinctive pottery featuring sweeping striped designs. The LBK people, the first farmers known to occupy central Europe, arose in modern-day Hungary and Slovakia about 7500 years ago and within 500 years had spread as far west as France and as far east as the Ukraine.