A 2025 BioRxiv preprint sequences Golden Horde elites and reports Y‑chromosome data that bear directly on whether Jochi—Genghis Khan’s eldest—was a biological son. This turns a 13th‑century legitimacy dispute into a testable claim and maps how imperial male lines spread across Eurasia.
— Genomics can now confirm or overturn myths that underpin national identity and history education, shifting debates from legend to evidence.
Razib Khan
2025.10.10
60% relevant
Like the Mongol‑lineage case, this piece uses ancient DNA to resolve historical questions—here, showing Old Kingdom Egyptians are genetically continuous with present‑day Egyptians and using one ancient genome to probe earlier admixture events.
Lorenzo Warby
2025.08.24
55% relevant
Like the Mongol paternity piece, this article deploys ancient DNA evidence (e.g., Neolithic y‑chromosome bottleneck, Mesolithic–Neolithic replacement in the British Isles) to revise moralized historical narratives—here, that European wealth is uniquely rooted in plunder—showing genetics can upend comforting myths.
Isegoria
2025.08.14
55% relevant
It similarly uses ancient DNA to reinterpret history—here, alleging a late Roman decline in cognitive ability—showing genomics being applied to settle or reshape socio-historical claims.
Razib Khan
2025.08.09
63% relevant
Like the use of ancient DNA to resolve a medieval paternity dispute, Hawks argues that extracting DNA—or failing that, protein sequences—from Homo naledi, Flores, and Luzon fossils will supply the statistical power to adjudicate claims of very deep admixture into modern humans.
Razib Khan
2025.07.14
100% relevant
Askapuli et al., 2025, 'Genomes of the Golden Horde Elites,' analyzing elite burials (e.g., Ulytau, Kazakhstan) and their Y‑lineages as a de facto 842‑year‑old paternity test.