The Family of Koszyce

In a single pit near Koszyce lay fifteen people of the Globular Amphora culture: men, women and children of one extended family, from a toddler to elders, killed together in a raid some five thousand years ago. Whoever buried them knew them: mothers were placed beside their children, siblings side by side, the grave richly furnished. The fathers of the family are missing from the pit, likely away when the attack came, and likely the ones who came home to bury everyone they loved. Their genomes show a close-knit farming community without steppe ancestry, living, and dying, on the frontier where the expanding Corded Ware world was pressing into theirs.

The genome-wide data behind this entry was published in Unraveling ancestry, kinship, and violence in a Late Neolithic mass grave.

Every Ancestry Map includes the free Notable Matches lens: your coordinates are compared to every sequenced member of every catalog entry, and the distance to the closest member is reported, a Euclidean distance in the same 25-dimensional space the Distance lens uses. Because these are a small group of real individuals, not a population average, distances naturally run larger than population distances. That is expected, not a poor result. And one thing is never claimed: a small distance means similar ancestry composition, not that the Family of Koszyce are your ancestor. See how it looks in the live demo or read about Ancestry Map, the full Global25 report.

• 01

  Who were the Family of Koszyce?

  The Family of Koszyce (c. 2950-2700 BCE, Koszyce, Lesser Poland, Poland) are one of the Iconic discoveries entries in our Notable Matches catalog, represented by 12 sequenced ancient genomes published in the study "Unraveling ancestry, kinship, and violence in a Late Neolithic mass grave".

• 02

  What does "matching" the Family of Koszyce mean?

  Your Global25 coordinates are compared to the entry's sequenced members and the distance to the closest one is reported, a Euclidean distance in the same 25-dimensional reference space the Distance lens uses. A notable entry is one person or one small burial group, not a population average, so distances naturally run larger than population distances.

• 03

  Are they my ancestor?

  No, and no DNA test can show that. A small distance means your genome sits near theirs in a shared reference space: similar ancestry composition, not descent. Ancestrify never claims a notable individual is your ancestor or relative.

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  How do I see my own distance to the Family of Koszyce?

  Notable Matches is a free lens on every Ancestry Map, never sold separately. Order Ancestry Map, our Global25 analysis (29.99 EUR), and your report ranks your coordinates against the full catalog, with a portrait, dossier and map for every entry. The public demo shows the lens with example data.

The catalog holds every published entry across three tiers. Browse the full Notable Matches directory. Nearby entries:

• The Seal Hunters of Gotlandc. 3000-2700 BCE

• The Burnt City of Shahr-i Sokhtac. 3000-2550 BCE

• The Old Kingdom Egyptian of Nuwayratc. 2855-2570 BCE

• The Vučedol Culturec. 3000-2200 BCE

• The Kura-Araxes Peoplec. 3000-2350 BCE

• The Collective Tomb of Buryc. 3200-2500 BCE

• The Ancient City of Tepe Hissarc. 3600-2400 BCE

• The Megalith Farmers of Falbygdenc. 3300-2800 BCE

• The Indus Peripheryc. 3100-1950 BCE

• Mota of the Ethiopian Highlandsc. 2500 BCE

• The Newgrange Chieftainc. 3200 BCE

• Ötzi the Icemanc. 3350-3120 BCE