With opulent graves but no written records, the empire and its people have remained largely in the shadows of history until recently. But a landmark April 2022 study involving ancient DNA taken from the graves of the Avar elite shed light on the empire’s far-flung origins. A tiny sample is drilled from a bone at the ancient DNA laboratory at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany. In the case of men, researchers found two partners in 10 cases, three partners in four cases and four partners in one case. “Polygamy (having multiple marriage partners), serial monogamous marriages and extramarital relations are all possible explanations,” she said.

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Persons: ”, Zsófia Rácz, Rácz, aren’t, Guido Alberto Gnecchi, Max Planck, Eötvös Loránd University Múzeum Lara Cassidy, “, polygyny, Ruscone, Cassidy, Bryan Miller, wasn’t Organizations: CNN, of Archaeological Sciences, Eötvös Loránd, Múzeum, University’s, Archaeological Sciences, Max, Max Planck Institute, Eötvös Loránd University, Trinity College Dublin, Turks, Central, University of Michigan Locations: Central, Eastern Europe, Hungary, Rákóczifalva, Budapest, Leipzig, Germany, Europe, Mongolia, Caucasus, what’s, Constantinople, Byzantine, Eurasia