It is unclear whether Indo-European languages in Europe spread from the Pontic steppes in the late Neolithic, or from Anatolia in the Early Neolithic. Under the former hypothesis, people of the Globular Amphorae culture (GAC) would be descended from Eastern ancestors, likely representing the Yamnaya culture. However, nuclear (six individuals typed for 597 573 SNPs) and mitochondrial (11 complete sequences) DNA from the GAC appear closer to those of earlier Neolithic groups than to the DNA of all other populations related to the Pontic steppe migration. Explicit comparisons of alternative demographic models via approximate Bayesian computation confirmed this pattern. These results are not in contrast to Late Neolithic gene flow from the Pontic steppes into Central Europe. However, they add nuance to this model, showing that the eastern affinities of the GAC in the archaeological record reflect cultural influences from other groups from the East, rather than the movement of people.

Little is known about the genetic prehistory of Sardinia because of the scarcity of pre-Neolithic human remains. From a genetic perspective, modern Sardinians are known as genetic outliers in Europe, showing unusually high levels of internal diversity and a close relationship to early European Neolithic farmers. However, how far this peculiar genetic structure extends and how it originated was to date impossible to test. Here we present the first and oldest complete mitochondrial sequences from Sardinia, dated back to 10,000 yBP. These two individuals, while confirming a Mesolithic occupation of the island, belong to rare mtDNA lineages, which have never been found before in Mesolithic samples and that are currently present at low frequencies not only in Sardinia, but in the whole Europe. Preliminary Approximate Bayesian Computations, restricted by biased reference samples for Mesolithic Sardinia (the two typed samples) and Neolithic Europe (limited to central and north European sequences), suggest that the first inhabitants of the island have had a small or negligible contribution to the present-day Sardinian population, which mainly derives its genetic diversity from continental migration into the island by Neolithic times.

These authors contributed equally to this study.Electronic supplementary material is available online at https://dx.

From the first century AD, Europe has been interested by population movements, commonly known as Barbarian migrations. Among these processes, the one involving the Longobard culture interested a vast region, but its dynamics and demographic impact remains largely unknown. Here we report 87 new complete mitochondrial sequences coming from nine earlymedieval cemeteries located along the area interested by the Longobard migration (Czech Republic, Hungary and Italy). From the same areas, we sampled necropoleis characterized by cultural markers associated with the Longobard culture (LC) and coeval burials where no such markers were found, or with a chronology slightly preceding the presumed arrival of the Longobards in that region (NLC). Population genetics analysis and demographic modeling highlighted a similarity between LC individuals, as reflected by the sharing of quite rare haplogroups and by the degree of genetic resemblance between Hungarian and Italian LC necropoleis estimated via a Bayesian approach, ABC. The demographic model receiving the strongest statistical support also postulates a contact between LC and NLC communities, thus indicating a complex dynamics of admixture in medieval Europe.

From the first century AD, Europe has been interested by population movements, commonly known as Barbarian migrations. Among these processes, the one involving the Longobard culture interested a vast region, but its dynamics and demographic impact remains largely unknown. Here we report 87 new complete mitochondrial sequences coming from nine early-medieval cemeteries located along the area interested by the Longobard migration (Czech Republic, Hungary and Italy).From the same locations, we sampled necropolises characterized by cultural markers associated with the Longobard culture (LC) and coeval burials where no such markers were found (NLC).Population genetics analysis and ABC modeling highlighted a similarity between LC individuals, as reflected by a certain degree of genetic continuity between these groups, that reached 70% among Hungary and Italy. Models postulating a contact between LC and NLC communities received also high support, indicating a complex dynamics of admixture in medieval Europe.