The Parthians of Gilan

On the humid Caspian slopes of Gilan, the cemetery of Liarsangbon holds around a hundred catacomb-type tombs of the Parthian and Sasanian eras, excavated from 2016 onward and stocked with goods that reached Iran from Roman Egypt. These four people were buried there around the turn of the millennium, subjects of the Parthian empire. Their genomes carry 45 to 51 percent of the ancestry of Iran's first farmers and the hunter-gatherers of the Caucasus, persisting unbroken from the Copper Age, together with a western Anatolian farming component of 16 to 26 percent. That mixture runs straight through to modern Iranians, evidence of three thousand years of genetic continuity on the northern plateau.

The genome-wide data behind this entry was published in Ancient DNA indicates 3,000 years of genetic continuity in the Northern Iranian Plateau, from the Copper Age to the Sassanid Empire.

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 Parthians of Gilan are your ancestor. See how it looks in the live demo or read about Ancestry Map, the full Global25 report.

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  Who were the Parthians of Gilan?

  The Parthians of Gilan (c. 100 BCE-50 CE, Liarsangbon, Amlash, Gilan, Iran) are one of the Historical figures entries in our Notable Matches catalog, represented by 4 sequenced ancient genomes published in the study "Ancient DNA indicates 3,000 years of genetic continuity in the Northern Iranian Plateau, from the Copper Age to the Sassanid Empire".

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  What does "matching" the Parthians of Gilan 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.

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  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 Parthians of Gilan?

  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:

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• The Gandharans of the Early Historic Agec. 650 BCE-100 CE

• The Princess of Hasslebenc. 300 CE

• Aak of the Frisian Terps356-57 BCE

• The Georgians of Late Antiquity2nd-6th century CE

• The Christians of Nicaea's Sunken Basilicac. 350-700 CE

• Emperor Wu of Northern Zhou543-578 CE

• Empress Ashina551-582 CE

• The Türks of Gurvan Dovc. 540-635 CE

• The Byzantine Villagers of Chhîmc. 430-760 CE

• The Kunbábony Avar Khagan630-670 CE

• The Early Medieval Georgiansc. 400-900 CE