Ancestry populations · Hunter Gatherer and Neolithic Farmer
Sarazm Copper Age
The Copper Age townspeople of Sarazm in the Zeravshan valley of Tajikistan, farmers and metalworkers with mostly Iranian plateau ancestry. One of the 18 curated source populations in the Hunter Gatherer and Neolithic Farmer era of Ancient Ancestry, Ancestrify's qpAdm analysis.
Who they were
- Period
- 3700 to 3300 BC
- Era in the analysis
- Hunter Gatherer and Neolithic Farmer
- Region
- Zeravshan valley, western Tajikistan
- Role in the model
- Source (left) population, a reference qpAdm tests against
Sarazm, on the Zeravshan river near Panjakent in western Tajikistan, is one of the oldest farming towns of Central Asia. Its people grew wheat and barley, kept sheep, goats and cattle, worked copper and made beads of turquoise and carnelian that travelled along exchange routes linking the Iranian plateau, southern Turkmenistan and the northern steppe. The two individuals sampled here, both women, lived between about 3700 and 3300 BC (Narasimhan et al. 2019).
Their genomes are dominated by ancestry related to the early farmers of the Iranian plateau, with a smaller component related to hunter-gatherers to the north. The same farmer-rich mix is found a thousand years later in the towns of the Oxus civilisation in Bactria and Margiana (Narasimhan et al. 2019).
In Ancient Ancestry, Ancestrify's qpAdm analysis, Sarazm Copper Age is a source in the "Hunter Gatherer and Neolithic Farmer" era. The report shows its weight with a standard error and a Z-score, so you can see not only how much of the model it carries but how confidently that share is separated from zero, and a model that cannot support it is rejected rather than published. For genomes from Central Asia, Iran and South Asia it stands beside the Iranian Neolithic Farmer source, and its weight should be read together with the sources it overlaps.
mtDNA J1d and W6 are the lineages of the two Sarazm women. A haplogroup alone is never evidence of a share.
In your reportArtwork is an AI-generated artistic interpretation informed by the archaeological record, not documentary evidence.The people of Sarazm lived in the Zeravshan valley of what is now western Tajikistan between about 3700 and 3300 BC, in one of the oldest farming towns of Central Asia. They grew wheat and barley, herded sheep, goats and cattle, built houses of mud brick around open courtyards, and were skilled metalworkers and bead makers who traded copper, turquoise and carnelian along routes reaching the Iranian plateau, Turkmenistan and the northern steppe. Their ancestry came mostly from the early farming peoples of the Iranian plateau, with a smaller share from hunter-gatherers to the north. Later peoples of the Oxus civilisation in Bactria and Margiana carried much of the same farmer ancestry, and its traces survive in the peoples of Central and South Asia today.
Where this population sits in the model
Ancient Ancestry, our qpAdm analysis, models your genome once per era. The Hunter Gatherer and Neolithic Farmer era has 18 curated source populations, and Sarazm Copper Age is one of them: every candidate model for that era is a combination of these sources, tested against a fixed set of outgroup populations, and only a model that passes the statistical fit check is published, with a p-value and a standard error on every proportion.
A reference, not a verdict: every population on this page is a source the model tests your genome against, a well-sampled point in ancient genetic space that a mixture of ancestries can be expressed in terms of. A weight on it means your genome is well described as partly resembling those people; it is never a statement that they, specifically, were your ancestors, and a population that fits well is not the only one that could.
Read how qpAdm works on the Ancient Ancestry page, or the definitions in the glossary.
Model it yourself for free
The Ancestrify Lab runs in your browser, with no account. Paste a Global25 row into an admixture calculator that covers the Hunter Gatherer and Neolithic Farmer era, rank the closest ancient populations in the distance tool, or run f4, qpWave and qpAdm on the public panel in the AdmixTools 2 workbench. These are Global25 fits and exploratory statistics, not the formal qpAdm model of Ancient Ancestry.
Questions
Who were the Sarazm Copper Age (3700 to 3300 BC)?
Sarazm Copper Age is one of the 18 curated source populations in the Hunter Gatherer and Neolithic Farmer era of Ancient Ancestry, Ancestrify's qpAdm analysis: a group of published genomes pooled as a single reference the model can test your genome against. These are ancient individuals from one archaeological context wherever the record holds them, and present-day genomes standing in where it does not, which the description on this page says.
Does Sarazm Copper Age in my result mean they were my ancestors?
No. A source population is a reference the model tests against, never a statement about who your ancestors were. A coefficient on this source means the ancestry those burials represent helps explain your genome to within statistical noise: similar ancestry composition, not descent from those individuals. Ancestrify never claims a population is your ancestor.
What does a Sarazm Copper Age percentage in a qpAdm model mean?
qpAdm estimates the mixture proportions that best explain your genome as a combination of the chosen sources, given a fixed set of outgroup (right) populations, and reports a p-value for whether the model is statistically acceptable together with a standard error for every proportion. The percentage is that estimated share, with its uncertainty published beside it.
How do I get a qpAdm model that uses Sarazm Copper Age?
Order Ancient Ancestry, Ancestrify's qpAdm analysis (€29.99, one-time), and upload the raw file you already have from a consumer test. Your genome is merged into the AADR reference panel and modelled across both eras; each era's model is built from that era's source populations, so a model for the Hunter Gatherer and Neolithic Farmer era draws on Sarazm Copper Age where it improves the fit.
Can I model Sarazm Copper Age ancestry for free first?
Yes. The Ancestrify Lab runs Global25 admixture calculators, a nearest-populations distance tool and an AdmixTools 2 workbench in your browser with no account, and several calculators cover the Hunter Gatherer and Neolithic Farmer era. Those are G25 fits, not formal qpAdm models. Ancient Ancestry, the paid analysis, is the one with a p-value.
More populations from the Hunter Gatherer and Neolithic Farmer era
Browse the full directory of source populations, or continue with another population from the same era:
Anatolian Neolithic Farmer8500 to 6000 BC
Ancestral South Indian10000 to 2000 BC
Caucasian Hunter Gatherer13000 to 7000 BC
Early European Farmer5500 to 4900 BC
East Asian Neolithic Farmer5000 to 2000 BC
Eastern Hunter Gatherer12000 to 5000 BC
Iberomaurusian15000 to 8000 BC
Iranian Neolithic Farmer8000 to 5000 BC
Levantine Neolithic Farmer8800 to 6500 BC
Native American15000 to 1500 BC
Natufian12000 to 8000 BC
North African Farmer5200 to 4000 BC
Northeast Asian6000 to 2000 BC
Sub Saharan African
West African10000 to 1500 BC
Western Hunter Gatherer12000 to 6000 BC
Western Steppe Herder5000 to 2800 BC