The Yamnaya archaeological complex appeared around 3300 BC across the steppes north of the Black and Caspian Seas, and by 3000 BC it reached its maximal extent, ranging from Hungary in the west to Kazakhstan in the east. To localize Yamnaya origins among the preceding Eneolithic people, we assembled ancient DNA from 435 individuals, demonstrating three genetic clines. A Caucasus-lower Volga (CLV) cline suffused with Caucasus hunter-gatherer1 ancestry extended between a Caucasus Neolithic southern end and a northern end at Berezhnovka along the lower Volga river. Bidirectional gene flow created intermediate populations, such as the north Caucasus Maikop people, and those at Remontnoye on the steppe. The Volga cline was formed as CLV people mixed with upriver populations of Eastern hunter-gatherer2 ancestry, creating hypervariable groups, including one at Khvalynsk. The Dnipro cline was formed when CLV people moved west, mixing with people with Ukraine Neolithic hunter-gatherer ancestry3 along the Dnipro and Don rivers to establish Serednii Stih groups, from whom Yamnaya ancestors formed around 4000 BC and grew rapidly after 3750-3350 BC. The CLV people contributed around four-fifths of the ancestry of the Yamnaya and, entering Anatolia, probably from the east, at least one-tenth of the ancestry of Bronze Age central Anatolians, who spoke Hittite4,5. We therefore propose that the final unity of the speakers of 'proto-Indo-Anatolian', the language ancestral to both Anatolian and Indo-European people, occurred in CLV people some time between 4400 BC and 4000 BC.

Amber was one of the key raw materials distributed in Bronze Age Europe. One of its varieties – succinite – wasexchanged over a vast area stretching from its sources on the southern shores of the Baltic Sea to the shores of the Mediterranean Sea. The chemical identification of Baltic amber significantly expands our knowledge of the dynamics and nature of the relationships connecting different regions of Europe in the first half of the second millennium BC. One of the most significant cultural-geographical areas reached by this amber was the Carpathian Basin. This text presents a summary of the current state of knowledge about the context, chronology, and the extent of amber occurrence in the Hungarian Bronze Age. At the same time, it supplements the catalogue of finds with artefacts acquired in recent years, providing new information regarding radiocarbon dating and spectral analysis of selected amber artifacts.

Abstract The multi-stratified site of Túrkeve-Terehalom presents an exceptional opportunity to establish the start and the end of the Middle Bronze Age in the Eastern Carpathian Basin and to refine its inner chronology. The chronological potential of the site rests on the meticulous excavation campaigns over a decade. This potential has been harvested by linking stratified finds, particularly pottery, to narrow, calibrated age-ranges. The result has implications for local chronology while also prompting questions about how to synchronise long-range connectivity with central and northern Europe and the Aegean, as well. The resulting chronological model for Túrkeve-Terehalom firstly challenges prevailing chronological views regarding the life-spans of Bronze Age structures with beaten clay floors, secondly the direction of the wave of destruction and/or abandonment of multi-stratified sites in the Carpathian Basin, and thirdly the continental networking during the Middle Bronze Age.

Bár írásos emlékeket nem ismerünk a bronzkor időszakából, a Kárpát-medencét érintő későbbi (pl. kora középkori) népvándorlásokra vonatkozó források ismeretében gyakran a bronzkor változásait is új népek betelepüléséhez, kisebb-nagyobb migrációkhoz kötötte a régészeti kutatás. Az utóbbi két évtizedben újra előtérbe került a történelem előtti időkben feltételezhető eurázsiai vándorlások nyomainak azonosítása, a kutatásba immár más tudományágak, többek között az izotóp-geokémia vagy az archeogenetika eredményeit is bevonva. Az MTA Lendület program támogatásával 2015-ben elindult kutatási projekt a mai Magyarországon feltárt települések, temetkezések és az innen előkerült használati tárgyak vizsgálatát tűzte ki céljául. A hazai bronzkor kutatásában eddig nem alkalmazott, 21. századi multidiszciplináris módszerek együttes használatával kerestünk választ a nagy piramisok építői és a mükénéi aknasírokba temetett görög hősök korában térségünkben letelepedett közösségek emlékanyagában megfigyelt társadalmi változások kérdéseire. Jelen tanulmány a korszakban élt emberek életmódjára és egészségi állapotára, illetve a mobilitás értelmezésére vonatkozó biorégészeti kutatási eredményeket foglalja össze.

Although there is no textual evidence known from the Bronze Age, written sources describing migrations of later (i.e. Early Medieval) periods effecting the Carpathian Basin were interpreted as instances of cultural and population change which could be comparable with processes that took place during the Bronze Age in the Carpathian Basin. In the past two decades, Eurasian archaeological research received a new impetus to investigate the traces of migrations during prehistory, in collaboration with other disciplines such as isotope geochemistry or archaeogenetics. The current project which commenced in 2015, funded by the ‛Momentum Programme’ of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, was set out to investigate the societal changes that had taken place within the boundaries of modern-day Hungary – contemporaneous with the builders of the great pyramids of Egypt and the Greek heroes of the Mycenaean shaft graves – by analysing the settlements, cemeteries and the artefacts recovered from these archaeological sites. The project, for the first time in Hungarian Bronze Age research, employs a range of multidisciplinary methodologies in order to examine the social changes of the period. The present paper is to provide an overview of a particular aspect of this research: the outcomes of the bioarchaeological enquiries with special regards to the general health, mobility and the lifestyle of studied populations.

The chronological system established by Paul Reinecke played a significant role in developing a chronological classification of the Hungarian Bronze Age. However, the relative chronology which is currently being used for the Early and Middle Bronze Age by the majority of Hungarian scholars is based on István Bóna’s tempo ral sequence. Although Bóna’s relative chronology is still regarded as the ‘lingua franca’ in Hungary, several attempts have been made to synchronise Bóna’s relative chronological system of the Hungarian Bronze Age with the Reinecke scheme in the last two decades. The present paper compares the two relative chronological systems and highlights some common cornerstones, supported by the most recent AMS 14C dates from the Carpathian Basin.

This paper presents the results of a research project, which was launched in 1999 by the Institute of Archaeological Sciences of the ELTE. Our main goal was to create a register of Hungarian tell settlements. First we collected all available information on tell settlements from the archaeological literature and various museum archives. Following this preliminary data filtering, fifty of the initial 161 Neolithic sites and 116 of the 224 Bronze Age sites were classified as genuine tells or tell-like settlements. After that we determined the accurate location and co-ordinates of the sites using aerial photography called for the construction of a GIS database. The destruction (by erosion, by flood, etc.) of the tell settlements can be monitored virtually from one day to the other. In addition to a precise site condition assessment, the project yielded fresh information about settlement layouts, such as the presence of enclosures. At some sites, aerial photography was followed by a magnetometer survey.

This paper presents the results of a research project, which was launched in 1999 by the Institute of Archaeological Sciences of the ELTE. Our main goal was to create a register of Hungarian tell settlements. First we collected all available information on tell settlements from the archaeological literature and various museum archives. Following this preliminary data filtering, fifty of the initial 161 Neolithic sites and 116 of the 224 Bronze Age sites were classified as genuine tells or tell-like settlements. After that we determined the accurate location and co-ordinates of the sites using aerial photography called for the construction of a GIS database. The destruction (by erosion, by flood, etc.) of the tell settlements can be monitored virtually from one day to the other. In addition to a precise site condition assessment, the project yielded fresh information about settlement layouts, such as the presence of enclosures. At some sites, aerial photography was followed by a magnetometer survey.