Creationism in Crisis - Multiple Origins of Multi-Ethnic Mongolian Nomads

Creationism in Crisis

Multiple Origins of Multi-Ethnic Mongolian Nomads

The Xiongnu built a multiethnic empire on the Mongolian steppe that was connected by trade to Rome,
Egypt, and Imperial China.

© Artwork by Galmandakh Amarsanaa, courtesy of Christina Warinner and the DairyCultures Project

Multiethnic structure of Mongolia’s first nomadic empire | Max-Planck-Gesellschaft

If they weren't ignorant of it and hadn't been given strategies for dismissing inconvenient facts, the work of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany, would be spreading fear and despondency throughout the creationist cults.

This is the Institute the first brought us news that anatomically modern humans interbred with both Neanderthals and Denisovans before they became extinct about 40,000 years ago, and which has developed techniques for extracting and analyzing DNA from ancient remains and showing the ancient origins of humans from long before creationist superstition says humans were magically created as a single couple who had no ancestors, just a few thousand years ago, creating an incestuous family from which we are all supposedly descended.

The work of the Max Planck Institute is showing that not only is the modern human species, Homo sapiens, much older than that, it is more genetically diverse than would be the case if the superstition had any basis in fact. And, far from being the descendants of a single founder couple, all non-African humans are the descendants not even of a single founder species but from hybrids of at least three different species, so ruling out a single founder couple that could have committed the central article of faith for all Christians - the Original Sin.

And now the Institute brings us news that a Mongolian empire in Central Asia, which co-existed some 2000 years ago with the Roman Empire, and before then with the Egyptian civilization, was comprised of multiethnic peoples that had been incorporated into the empire to give it a genetic diversity that was far greater than would be the case had the Earth really been repopulated from another incestuous family, following a genocidal global flood just a couple of thousand years earlier.

First, a little about the Xiongnu:

The Xiongnu Confederation was a nomadic confederation that existed from the 3rd century BCE to the late 1st century CE in present-day Mongolia, Siberia, and Central Asia. They were known for their military prowess, and their interactions with China were important in shaping both Chinese and Central Asian history. The origins of the Xiongnu are not well understood, but they are believed to have emerged from various tribes in the region around the Ordos Plateau in northern China. By the 3rd century BCE, the Xiongnu had become a powerful confederation under the leadership of their first known leader, Touman. The Xiongnu were known for their skill in horseback riding and archery, and they were able to conquer many neighboring tribes and states. They also had a complex political system that included a ruling council, with the leader (shanyu) at the top, and a social hierarchy based on military merit. The Xiongnu frequently raided the Han Dynasty in China, and the two powers engaged in intermittent warfare for several centuries. The Han Dynasty eventually established a policy of appeasement towards the Xiongnu, which involved paying them tribute and marrying Han princesses to Xiongnu leaders. The Xiongnu also had significant cultural and economic interactions with other neighboring states, including the Yuezhi, the Wusun, and the Xianbei. These interactions played an important role in the spread of Buddhism and other cultural and religious practices across Central Asia. In the late 1st century CE, the Xiongnu Confederation began to decline due to internal conflicts and external pressures from the expanding Han Dynasty and other neighboring states. The Xiongnu were eventually conquered by the Han Dynasty, and the remnants of the confederation merged with other groups to form the Xianbei confederation.

References:

1. Di Cosmo, N. (2002). Ancient China and its Enemies: The Rise of Nomadic Power in East Asian History. Cambridge University Press.
2. Kradin, N. N. (2010). Xiongnu Empire. In P. C. K. Lam (Ed.), Historical Dictionary of the Mongol World Empire (pp. 363-366). The Scarecrow Press, Inc.
3. Loewe, M. (1986). The Former Han Dynasty. In D. Twitchett & M. Loewe (Eds.), The Cambridge History of China: Volume 1, The Ch'in and Han Empires, 221 BC-AD 220 (pp. 103-222). Cambridge University Press.

ChatGPT. (2023, April 16). All about the Xiongnu confederation, with references, please [Response to a user question]. OpenAI. https://openai.com/

As the Max Planck Institute news release explains:

The Xiongnu dominated the Eurasian steppes two millennia ago and foreshadowed the rise of the Mongol Empire

The Xiongnu, contemporaries of Rome and Egypt, built their nomadic empire on the Mongolian steppe 2,000 years ago, emerging as Imperial China’s greatest rival and even inspiring the construction of China’s Great Wall. In a new study researchers find that the Xiongnu were a multiethnic empire, with high genetic diversity found across the empire and even within individual extended elite families. At the fringes of the empire, women held the highest positions of power, and the highest genetic diversity was found among low-status male servants, giving clues to the process of empire building that gave rise to Asia’s first nomadic imperial power.

Long obscured in the shadows of history, the world’s first nomadic empire - the Xiongnu - is at last coming into view thanks to painstaking archaeological excavations and new ancient DNA evidence. Arising on the Mongolian steppe 1,500 years before the Mongols, the Xiongnu empire grew to be one of Iron Age Asia’s most powerful political forces - ultimately stretching its reach and influence from Egypt to Rome to Imperial China. Economically grounded in animal husbandry and dairying, the Xiongnu were famously nomadic, building their empire on the backs of horses. Their proficiency at mounted warfare made them swift and formidable foes, and their legendary conflicts with Imperial China ultimately led to the construction of the Great Wall.

We knew that the Xiongnu had a high degree of genetic diversity, but due to a lack of community-scale genomic data it remained unclear whether this diversity emerged from a heterogeneous patchwork of locally homogenous communities or whether local communities were themselves genetically diverse. We wanted to know how such genetic diversity was structured at different social and political scales, as well as in relation to power, wealth, and gender.

Juhyeon Lee, first author
PhD student
Seoul National University, Seoul, South Korea

However, unlike their neighbors, the Xiongnu never developed a writing system, and consequently historical records about the Xiongnu have been almost entirely written and passed down by their rivals and enemies. Such accounts, largely recorded by Han Dynasty chroniclers, provide little useful information on the origins of the Xiongnu, their political rise, or their social organization. Although recent archaeogenetics studies have now traced the origins of the Xiongnu as a political entity to a sudden migration and mixing of disparate nomadic groups in northern Mongolia ca. 200 BCE, such findings have raised more questions than answers.

To better understand the inner workings of the seemingly enigmatic Xiongnu empire, an international team of researchers at the Max Planck Institutes for Evolutionary Anthropology and Geoanthropology, Seoul National University, the University of Michigan, and Harvard University conducted an in-depth genetic investigation of two imperial elite Xiongnu cemeteries along the western frontier of the empire: an aristocratic elite cemetery at Takhiltyn Khotgor and a local elite cemetery at Shombuuzyn Belchir.

The rise of a multiethnic empire

Excavation of the Xiongnu Elite Tomb 64 containing a high status aristocratic woman at the site of Takhiltiin Khotgor, Mongolian Altai.

© J. Bayarsaikhan

Researchers found that individuals within the two cemeteries exhibited extremely high genetic diversity, to a degree comparable with that found across the Xiongnu Empire as a whole. In fact, high genetic diversity and heterogeneity was present at all levels – across the empire, within individual communities, and even within individual families - confirming the characterization of the Xiongnu Empire as a multiethnic empire. However, much of this diversity was stratified by status. The lowest status individuals (interred as satellite burials of the elites, likely reflecting a servant status) exhibited the highest genetic diversity and heterogeneity, suggesting that these individuals originated from far-flung parts of the Xiongnu Empire or beyond.

We now have a better idea of how the Xiongnu expanded their empire by incorporating disparate groups and leveraging marriage and kinship into empire building.

Professor Choongwon Jeong, Senior author
Associate Professor of Biological Sciences
Seoul National University, Seoul, South Korea.

In contrast, local and aristocratic elites buried in wood-plank coffins within square tombs and stone ring graves exhibited lower overall genetic diversity and harbored higher proportions of eastern Eurasian ancestries, suggesting that elite status and power was concentrated among specific genetic subsets of the broader Xiongnu population. Nevertheless, even elite families appear to have used marriage to cement ties to newly incorporated groups, especially at Shombuuzyn Belchir.

Powerful women in Xiongnu society

Golden icons of the sun and moon, symbols of the Xiongnu, decorating the coffin found in Elite Tomb 64 at the Takhiltiin Khotgor site, Mongolian Altai.

© J. Bayarsaikhan

Women held great power as agents of the Xiongnu imperial state along the frontier, often holding exclusive noble ranks, maintaining Xiongnu traditions, and engaging in both steppe power politics and the so-called Silk Road networks of exchange.

Professor Bryan Miller, co-author
Project archaeologist
Assistant Professor of Central Asian Art & Archaeology
University of Michigan, USA

A second major finding was that high status Xiongnu burials and elite grave goods were disproportionately associated with women, corroborating textual and archaeological evidence that Xiongnu women played especially prominent political roles in the expansion and integration of new territories along the empire’s frontier. At the aristocratic elite cemetery of Takhiltyn Khotgor, researchers found that the elite monumental tombs had been built for women, with each prominent woman flanked by a host of commoner males buried in simple graves. The women were interred in elaborate coffins with the golden sun and moon emblems of Xiongnu imperial power and one tomb even contained a team of six horses and a partial chariot.

At the nearby local elite cemetery of Shombuuzyn Belchir, women likewise occupied the wealthiest and most elaborate graves, with grave goods consisting of wooden coffins, golden emblems and gilded objects, glass and faience beads, Chinese mirrors, a bronze cauldron, silk clothing, wooden carts, and more than a dozen livestock, as well as three objects conventionally associated with male horse-mounted warriors: a Chinese lacquer cup, a gilded iron belt clasp, and horse tack. Such objects and their symbolism convey the great political power of the women.

Children in Xiongnu society

Child’s bow and arrow set from Grave 26 at the Shombuuziin Belchir cemetery.

© Bryan K. Miller

Children received differential mortuary treatment depending upon age and sex, giving clues to the ages at which gender and status were ascribed in Xiongnu society.

Professor Christina Warinner, co-senior author
Associate Professor of Anthropology
Harvard University
And Group Leader at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology

Our results confirm the long-standing nomadic tradition of elite princesses playing critical roles in the political and economic life of the empires, especially in periphery regions - a tradition that began with the Xiongnu and continued more than a thousand years later under the Mongol Empire. While history has at times dismissed nomadic empires as fragile and short, their strong traditions have never been broken.

Jamsranjav Bayarsaikhan, Co-author
Project archaeologist and Mongolian Archaeology Project:
Surveying the Steppes project coordinator
Max Planck Institute for Geoanthropology.

Genetic analysis also provided rare insights into the social roles of children in Xiongnu society. Researchers found, for example, that although adolescent Xiongnu boys as young as eleven to twelve years old were buried with a bow and arrows, in a manner resembling that of adult males, younger boys were not. This suggests that the gendered social roles of hunter and warrior were not ascribed to boys until late childhood or early adolescence.

Although the Xiongnu empire ultimately disintegrated in the late 1st century CE, the findings of the study point to the enduring social and cultural legacy of the Xiongnu.

As readers will know, I'm not one to gloat over the distress and discomfort of the creation cult frauds who recruit simpletons with lies and disinformation, but it will be instructive to see how few have the courage to tackle the information that there was a high degree of genetic diversity in Central Asia just 2000 years after creationists believe Earth was repopulated from just seven incestuous individuals - much higher than anything known rates of genetic mutation predict.

It will also be instructive to see how they ignore the evidence of a religion that had nothing to do with the religion of the survivors of the alleged genocidal flood. Are we expected to believe that the descendants of the survivors forgot all about the flood, the god who caused it, and the names of the survivors, migrated to Central Asia and invented their own gods and origin myths, while the Hebrews alone remembered it all in word-perfect detail?

This might fool a scientifically illiterate, ignorant simpleton, but it won't fool normal people.

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