István Riba

The Ethnogenesis of Hungarians
and Archaeogenetics

An Interview with Csanád Bálint, Director of the Archaeological Institute, Hungarian Academy of Sciences

 

István Riba: You recently completed a vast research project conducted jointly with the Institute of Genetics of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences. It uses the genetic study of skeletal remains to shed light on that perpetually elusive question: the origin of Hungarians. Would you please first explain historical genetics and the financing of the project?

Csanád Bálint: Ever since the field emerged in the 1980s, historical genetics has helped us to gain a clearer understanding of mankind’s origins, the dispersal of populations and early migrations. Hungarians were quick to embrace the work of one of the field’s great pioneers, Luigi Luca Cavalli-Sforza (even if the single sentence about Hungarians in his seminal work contains half a dozen basic errors). Attempts since to understand the genetic origins of Hungarians have met with mixed results both in and outside Hungary. To start with, there are serious methodological objections. We knew that examining the earliest skeletal remains of Hungarians, whose origins and language are unique in Central Europe, would be a valuable historical undertaking, but it was crucial to get archaeologists and geneticists to cooperate in the use of sound methods. The Archaeological Institute of HAS together with the Institute of Genetics attached to the Biological Research Centre of HAS in Szeged collaborated between 2001 and 2007 on the project and applied for a grant to finance it. As part of this project, the Laboratory of Archaeogenetics of the Archaeological Institute was established. At least 150 skeletal remains from the 10th and 11th centuries were analysed. In 90 cases this was successful, a high proportion for protohistorical bone finds. In the end, we were able to establish the haplotypes of sixty individuals.

You mentioned the importance of a sound methodology; what then are the pitfalls of archaeogenetics?

Geneticists have tended to address vital historical and linguistic questions without knowing enough about these fields. Their overreach means that conclusions are drawn about the origins of peoples and their interrelatedness, overlooking the fact that only individuals, not groups, can be regarded as biological entities. Groups and peoples are the product of history and are moulded socially. By co-operation with the geneticists in Szeged we wished to avoid these mistakes. Think of it this way: you could take genetic samples of Budapest residents today, but this would tell you precious little about the origin of the city’s inhabitants, given the city’s historical flux. Today’s populace is not a living fossil of the ancient one. Since there is a danger that the genetic sample can predetermine the outcome of the project, we wanted to be clear about the origin of samples and the basis for their selection. This is why the archaeologists in our project guided the geneticists in one direction or another. Before deciding what to use of the 10th–11th century genetic material, we thought long and hard about principles of classification: territorial (the principal regions of Hungary), chronological, social position and “rich” and “poor” graves (the presence of grave goods can have a great many different explanations) and the presumed culture to which the group belonged. In addition the geneticists took samples from people living in Hungary today and from Székelys in Transylvania.

You mentioned the rich–poor divide in 10th-century burials. In the 1960s and 1970s these graves were classified according to ethnicity. Is this approach valid?

10th-century burials were divided into rich and poor around a hundred years ago and matched with Hungarians and Slavs respectively. However, in recent decades it has become usual to regard them as graves of the elite, the middle stratum and the common people. The ethnocentric approach was, once at a time, in the past, the general practice in most countries. To our surprise, it is still that today in many places. In Communist Hungary it was expected, for ideological reasons, that finds and data should contribute to narrative history. These days it is clear what archaeologists mean when they say that a culture is not linked to ethnicity: the area where artefacts belonging to a culture are found is not necessarily identical with the area in which a particular people lived.

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István Riba
is a historian on the staff of HVG, an economic weekly.