Archeogenetics Research Group
Population genomics
Our major research topic is the archaeogenetic study of historical populations of the Carpathian Basin. In our laboratory we sequence and analyze ancient DNA (aDNA) obtained from ancient bones excavated and described by archaeologists. From ancient genome sequences we can infer genealogical and population level relatedness of the ancient individuals. From aDNA genome analysis we can also reveal the origin, migration and admixture histories of ancient populations. In our latest study we successfully reconstructed the genetic history of European Huns, Avars and conquering Hungarians.
Summary of the genetic origin of European Huns, Avars and conquering Hungarians from our Current Biology paper published in 2022.
A: A: Common “Proto-Ugric” ancestors of Mansis and Hungarians emerged from the admixture of Mezhovskaya and Nganasan populations in the late Bronze Age. B: 1. During the Iron Age Mansis separated; 2. Proto-Conquerors admixed with Early Sarmatians ca 643-431 BCE and 3. with pre-Huns ca 217-315 CE. (C) By the 5th century the Xiongnu derived Hun Empire occupied Eastern Europe incorporating its population, and the Rouran Khaganate emerged on the former Xiongnu territory. C: By the 5th century the Xiongnu derived Hun Empire occupied Eastern Europe incorporating its population, and the Rouran Khaganate emerged on the former Xiongnu territory. D: By the middle 6th century the Avar Khaganate occupied the territory of the former Hun Empire incorporating its populations. 4. By the 10th century Conquerors associated with the remnants of both empires during their migration and within the Carpathian Basin.
Identification of members of the Hungarian ruling houses
Another major research topic in our group is the identification of the remains of ancient Hungarian rulers and noblemen. So far we successfully identified several members of the Árpád dynasty.
Publications
Tihanyi Balázs, Maár Kitti, Kis Luca, Gînguță Alexandra, Varga Gergely I. B., Kovács Bence, Schütz Oszkár, Pálfi György, Neparáczki Endre, Török Tibor, Spekker Olga, Maróti Zoltán, Berthon William (2024) ‘But no living man am I’: Bioarchaeological evaluation of the first-known female burial with weapon from the 10th-century-CE Carpathian Basin PLOS ONE Read it
Varga Gergely I.B., Maróti Zoltán, Schütz Oszkár, Maár Kitti, Nyerki Emil, Tihanyi Balázs, Váradi Orsolya Anna, Gînguță Alexandra, Kovács Bence, Kiss Petra, Dosztig Monika, Gallina Zsolt, Török Tibor, B. Szabó János, Makoldi Miklós, Neparáczki Endre (2024) Archaeogenetic analysis revealed East Eurasian paternal origin to the Aba royal family of Hungary ISCIENCE Read it
Spekker Olga, Kiss P. Attila, Kis Luca, Király Kitty, Varga Sándor, Marcsik Antónia, Schütz Oszkár, Török Tibor, Hunt David R., Tihanyi Balázs (2024) White plague among the “forgotten people” from the Barbaricum of the Carpathian Basin–Cases with tuberculosis from the Sarmatian-period (3rd–4th centuries CE) archaeological site of Hódmezővásárhely–Kenyere-ér, Bereczki-tanya (Hungary) PLOS ONE Read it
Gînguță Alexandra, Kovács Bence, Schütz Oszkár, Tihanyi Balázs, Nyerki Emil, Maár Kitti, Maróti Zoltán, Varga Gergely I.B., Băcueț-Crișan Dan, Keresztes Timea, Török Tibor, Neparáczki Endre (2023) Genetic identification of members of the prominent Báthory aristocratic family ISCIENCE Read it
Török Tibor (2023) Integrating linguistic, archaeological and genetic perspectives unfold the origin of Ugrians GENES Read it
Nyerki Emil, Kalmár Tibor, Schütz Oszkár, Lima Rui M., Neparáczki Endre, Török Tibor, Maróti Zoltán (2023) correctKin: an optimized method to infer relatedness up to the 4th degree from low-coverage ancient human genomes GENOME BIOLOGY Read it
Varga Gergely I B, Lilla Alida Kristóf, Kitti Maár, Luca Kis, Oszkár Schütz, Orsolya Váradi, Bence Kovács, Alexandra Gînguță, Balázs Tihanyi, Péter L Nagy, Zoltán Maróti, Emil Nyerki, Tibor Török and Endre Neparáczki (2022) The archaeogenomic validation of Saint Ladislaus’ relic provides insights into the Árpád dynasty’s genealogy Journal of Genetics and Genomics Read it
Neparáczki Endre, Kis Luca, Maróti Zoltán, Kovács Bence, Varga Gergely I.B., Makoldi Miklós, Horolma Pamjav, Teiszler Éva, Tihanyi Balázs, Nagy Péter L., Maár Kitti, Gyenesei Attila, Schütz Oszkár, Dudás Eszter, Török Tibor, Pascuttini-Juraga Vesna, Peharda Ivančica, Vizi László Tamás, Horváth-Lugossy Gábor, Kásler Miklós (2022) The genetic legacy of the Hunyadi descendants HELIYON Read it
Maróti Zoltán, Endre Neparáczki, Oszkár Schütz, Kitti Maár, Gergely I.B.Varga, Bence Kovács, Tibor Kalmár, Emil Nyerki, István Nagy, Dóra Latinovics, Balázs Tihanyi, Antónia Marcsik, György Pálfi, Zsolt Bernert, Zsolt Gallina, Ciprián Horváth, Sándor Varga, László Költő, István Raskó, Péter L. Nagy, Csilla Balogh, Albert Zink, Frank Maixner, Anders Götherström, Robert George, Csaba Szalontai, Gergely Szenthe, Erwin Gáll, Attila P. Kiss, Bence Gulyás, Bernadett Ny. Kovacsóczy, Szilárd Sándor Gál, PéterTomka and TiborTörök (2022): The genetic origin of Huns, Avars, and conquering Hungarians Current Biology Read it
Tibor Török, Kitti Maár, István Gergely Varga and Zoltán Juhász (2022): A new linear combination method of haplogroup distribution central vectors to model population admixtures. Molecular Genetics and Genomics Read it
Gînguță Alexandra, Kovács Bence, Tihanyi Balázs, Maár Kitti, Schütz Oszkár, Maróti Zoltán, Varga Gergely István, Kiss P. Attila, Ioan Stanciu, Török Tibor and Neparáczki Endre (2022): Maternal Lineages of Gepids from Transylvania. Genes Read it
Maár Kitti, Varga Gergely, Kovács Bence, Schütz Oszkár, Maróti Zoltán, Kalmár Tibor, Nyerki Emil, Nagy István, Latinovics Dóra, Tihanyi Balázs, Marcsik Antónia, Pálfi György, Bernert Zsolt, Gallina Zsolt, Varga Sándor, Költő László, Raskó István, Török Tibor and Neparáczki Endre (2021): Maternal Lineages from 10-11th Century Commoner Cemeteries of Carpathian Basin Genes Read it
Varga Gergely I., Maár Kitti, Ginguta Alexandra, Kovács Bence, Tihanyi Balázs, Kis Luca, Váradi Orsolya, Kiss Petra, Szokolóczi Dávid, Schütz Oszkár, Maróti Zoltán, Nyerki Emil, Nagy István, Latinovics Dóra, Török Tibor, Neparáczki Endre (2021): An archaeogenetic approach to identify the remains of the Hungarian Kings EPHEMERIS HUNGAROLOGICA Read it
Neparáczki Endre, Maróti Zoltán, Kalmár Tibor, Maár Kitti, Nagy István, Latinovics Dóra, Kustár Ágnes, Pálfi György, Molnár Erika, Marcsik Antónia, BaloghCsilla, Lőrinczy Gábor, Gál Sándor Szilárd, Tomka Péter, Kovacsóczy Bernadett, Kovács László, Raskó István and Török Tibor (2019): Y-chromosome haplogroups from Hun, Avar and conquering Hungarian period nomadic people of the Carpathian Basin SCIENTIFIC REPORTS Read it
Neparáczki Endre, Maróti, Zoltán, Kalmár Tibor, Kocsy Klaudia, Maár Kitti, Bihari Péter, Nagy István, Fóthi Erzsébet, Pap Ildikó, Kustár Ágnes, Pálfi György, Raskó István, Albert Zink and Török Tibor (2018): Mitogenomic data indicate admixture components of Central-Inner Asian and Srubnaya origin in the conquering Hungarians PLOS ONE Read it
Neparáczki E, Kocsy K, Tóth GE, Maróti Z, Kalmár T, Bihari P, Nagy I, Pálfi Gy, Molnár E, Raskó I and Török T. (2017): Revising mtDNA haplotypes of the ancient Hungarian conquerors with next generation sequencing PLOS ONE Read it
Neparáczki Endre, Zoltán Juhász, Horolma Pamjav, Tibor Fehér, Bernadett Csányi, Albert Zink, Frank Maixner, György Pálfi, Erika Molnár, Ildikó Pap, Ágnes Kustár, László Révész, István Raskó and Tibor Török (2017): Genetic structure of the early Hungarian conquerors inferred from mtDNA haplotypes and Y-chromosome haplogroups in a small cemetery MOLECULAR GENETICS AND GENOMICS Read it
Konferencia előadások, poszterek:
15th International Meeting of the Society for Anthropology. Moving Forward in Biological Anthropology (2025):
The interdisciplinary investigation of the first-known female burial with weapon from the 10th-century-CE Carpathian Basin – Előadás
Hungarian Molecular Life Sciences (2025):
aHISplex: An imputation based method for eye, hair and skin colour prediction from low coverage ancient DNA – Előadás
Archaeogenetic investigation of the Gepid Period population of the Carpathian Basin – Előadás
Out of the kings’ shadows: Population genetic investigation of the remains from the royal basilica of Székesfehérvár – Előadás
EMBO/EMBL Symposium: Reconstructing the human past: using ancient and modern genomics (2024):
The origin and composition of the „forgotten people”: genetic analysis of the Sarmatian-period population of the Carpathian Basin – Előadás
aHISplex: an imputation-based method for eye, hair and skin colour prediction from low coverage ancient DNA – Poszter
Out of the kings’ shadows: population genetic investigation of the remains from the royal basilica of Székesfehérvár – Poszter
10th Meeting of the International Society for Biomolecular Archaeology (2023):
Preliminary genetic results about Sarmatians from the Carpathian Basin – Poszter
Reconstructing the human past: using ancient and modern genomics (2022):
The genetic origin of Huns, Avars and conquering Hungarians – Poszter
An optimized method to infer relatedness up to the 4th degree from low coverage ancient human genomes – Poszter
Members of the archaeogenetic research group:
Dr. István Varga Gergely
research fellow
Institute of Hungarian Research
54-4104
MTMT: 10043444 MTMT data sheet
Dr. Balázs Tihanyi
research fellow
Institute of Hungarian Research
MTMT: 10053309 MTMT data sheet
