Evidence for dynastic succession among early Celtic elites. Evidence for dynastic succession among early Celtic elites

The early Iron Age in France, Germany, and Switzerland, known as the West-Hallstattkreis, stands out as featuring the earliest evidence for supra-regional organisation north of the Alps. Often referred to as ‘early Celtic‘, suggesting tentative connections to later cultural phenomena, its societal and population structure remain enigmatic. Here, we present genomic and isotope data from 31 individuals from this context. We identify three biologically related groups spanning multiple elite burials as far as 100 km apart, supported by transregional individual mobility inferred from isotope data. These include a close biological relationship between two of the richest burial mounds of the Hallstatt culture. Bayesian modelling points to an avuncular relationship between the two individuals, which may suggest a practice of matrilineal dynastic succession in early Celtic elites. We show that their ancestry is shared on a broad geographic scale from Iberia throughout Central-Eastern Europe, undergoing decline after the late Iron Age.