Genetic analysis of a representative of the military nobility from the Dal'niy (Vydrin) burial ground of the Chernyakhov culture in the Kursk region.

During the late Roman period, the military and political conditions in Eastern Europe declined both along the frontier between the Roman Empire and Barbaricum and within those territories. The Chernyakhov culture played an important role in the dynamics of these events. According to historical and archaeological evidence, this society was formed by Germanic tribes that had moved into the region from northwestern Europe, as well as a nomadic population of the steppes. The Chernyakhov culture's funerary traditions included the placement of weapons, most likely solely in the graves of military nobles. In this context, human remains from these burials serve as a unique resource for archaeogenetic studies, enabling insights into the genetic origins of the military aristocracy within the Chernyakhov culture. In this paper, we present the results of a whole-genome analysis of a member of the military elite from a status burial of the Chernyakhov culture at the Dal'niy (Vydrin) burial ground, located on the northern border of the Chernyakhov culture area. According to archaeological data and previous anthropological analysis, the buried individual belonged to the military nobility of the late Chernyakhov culture, which lasted from the fourth to fifth centuries AD. The whole-genome sequences of this individual were generated by large-scale parallel sequencing. The individual was shown to be male. Analysis of haplogroup markers indicated the European origin of maternal and paternal lineages. The examination of autosomal markers clearly indicated a genetic link between this individual, associated with the warrior class of the Chernyakhov culture, and members of nomadic steppe groups, specifically the Scythians, Sarmatians, and Avars. The results contribute to our understanding of the complex picture of interethnic contacts that created the basis for the formation of the polyethnic Chernyakhov culture.