Loschbour Man

The hunter buried in the Loschbour rock shelter became the reference genome for all of Western Europe's Mesolithic foragers — the 'Western Hunter-Gatherers' whose blood still runs in every modern European. He lived by the rivers of Luxembourg, tall for his era, dark-skinned and light-eyed. His DNA helped prove that modern Europeans descend from three great ancestral streams.

The genome-wide data behind this entry was published in Ancient human genomes suggest three ancestral populations for Europeans.

Every Ancestrify Global25 report 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 this is a single real individual, 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 Loschbour Man is your ancestor. See how it looks in the live demo or read about the full G25 analysis.

• 01

  Who was Loschbour Man?

  Loschbour Man (c. 6100 BCE, Müllerthal, Luxembourg) is one of the Iconic discoveries entries in our Notable Matches catalog, represented by one sequenced ancient genome published in the study "Ancient human genomes suggest three ancestral populations for Europeans".

• 02

  What does "matching" Loschbour Man 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

  Is Loschbour Man my ancestor?

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

• 04

  How do I see my own distance to Loschbour Man?

  Notable Matches is a free lens on every Ancestrify Global25 report — never sold separately. Order the G25 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 First Farmers of Nea Nikomedeiac. 6300–6000 BCE

• The Shum Laka Childrenc. 6000 BCE and 1000 BCE

• The Hòabìnhian of Pha Faenc. 6000 BCE

• The First Farmers of Starčevoc. 6200–5500 BCE

• The Farmers of Çatalhöyükc. 7100–5900 BCE

• The Fisher-Foragers of Lepenski Virc. 9500–5500 BCE

• The First Farmers of the Linearbandkeramikc. 5500–4900 BCE

• The Takarkori Mummiesc. 5000 BCE

• The Vinča Culturec. 5300–4500 BCE

• The Ertebølle Fisher-Foragersc. 5400–4300 BCE

• The Varna Gold Elitec. 4600 BCE

• The Neolithic Peloponnesiansc. 6000–3200 BCE