Ancient DNA Reveals Limited Hunter-Gatherer Ancestry in the Cerny Culture (Middle Neolithic, France) Despite Hunting-Associated Practices

Abstract

The arrival of the Neolithic way of life in Europe is associated with the migration of Anatolian farmers and their admixture with local hunter-gatherers. In the Paris Basin (Northern France), the Middle Neolithic Cerny culture (4700–4300 bce) combines agricultural practices with funerary items linked to hunting, suggesting a particular connection with the local descendants of Mesolithic hunter-gatherers. The monumental burials gathering only a handful of deceased indicate the development of an elite. To better understand Cerny social structures, we generated genome-wide data for 28 individuals from the Paris basin, including 5 individuals from the Early Neolithic and 23 from various Cerny-associated necropolises. Our analysis revealed no significantly higher Mesolithic hunter-gatherer ancestry compared to other European Neolithic contemporaneous populations, indicating that distinctive cultural traits of the Cerny burials were not linked to biological admixture. We observed genetic continuity among the Paris Basin populations between the Early and Middle Neolithic, with minimal gene flow from other areas and a high degree of genetic homogeneity at the regional level. Finally, genetic relatedness and haplotype-sharing analyses identified only two close biological relationships, suggesting that Cerny necropolises in the Paris Basin were not organized only around biologically related individuals.