Scientists have uncovered the mystery of the origin of the ancient Scythians

The skull confirmed the words of Herodotus about the origin of the Scythians.

The ancient hypothesis that the ancestors of the Scythians came from Central Asia, has received substantiation in the features of skulls the black sea Scythians.

Scientists from MSU found that the Scythians descended from the mixing of the local black sea and Central Asian populations. This confirms the proposed 2.5 thousand years ago the point of view of the historian Herodotus, and also shows the scale of migrations in Eurasia in the first Millennium BC. The corresponding article published in American Journal of Physical Anthropology.

The authors have studied 323 of the late (IV–I century BC) of the skull of the Northern black sea and compared them with 109 skulls from the same region, but the times of the I–II Millennium BC. Then both groups were compared with 79 skulls from Central Asia I–II Millennium BC and skulls of the Sarmatians, who lived at the same time with the late Scythians. In each case, was taken to the set of 32 qualitative (not quantifiable) characteristics (features of the structure of skulls).

It turned out that among the late Scythians and Sarmatians lived to the East of similarities though, but less than between the ancient Prichernomorie and their Scythian successors. Moreover, the second most common structural features of the skull with the late Scythians showed the ancient inhabitants of Central Asia. It should, however, emphasize that there were living distinct Caucasians, probably of Indo-European origin.

That at least part of the Scythians came from the depths of Asia, wrote Herodotus 2.5 thousand years ago. However, to check his data all the time was difficult. The Scythians, probably, had no written language (at least, not preserved its monuments), but because of well-developed trade and cultural borrowing to distinguish one part of the Eurasian population from another and to trace their origins archaeologically always been very difficult.

paradox