![[Ямная_культура.jpg]] The most significant of these cultures was known as the [Yamnaya](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yamnaya_culture). These cart-using pastoralists originated in what is now Ukraine and eastern Russia about 5,300 years ago and spread through Europe over the next 700 years. Their style of pottery, known as [Corded Ware](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corded_Ware_culture), became prevalent by about 4,900 years ago throughout Central and Northern Europe, reaching as far as the Netherlands, the Baltic, and Scandinavia. The succeeding culture, named after its own distinctive pottery style, the [Bell Beaker](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bell_Beaker_culture), has been discovered to be about 70% Yamnaya in its ancestry. Percentages of ancestry vary quite a bit, by region; showing that there was quite a bit of chance involved in these meetings of natives and immigrants. For example, Sardinian islanders who were relatively protected from the immigrants retained the largest percentage of Anatolian Early European Farmer ancestry of all Europeans. On the other hand, the modern British population is descended over 90% from the Yamnaya-descended Bell Beaker culture that entered Britain about 4,500 years ago. This means that the people who built most of [Stonehenge](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stonehenge) between 5,100 and 4,600 years ago _disappeared_ and were almost entirely replaced by a new, Yamnaya-descended population, just a century later. It does seem that the newcomers valued the monument though: the final "bluestone" circle and horseshoe seems to have been added by Bell Beaker people. ![[Stonehenge_Total.jpg]] *The large stones visible in this photo of Stonehenge are "Sarsen" stones erected by the people who were replaced by the Bell Beaker culture.* ---- Next: [[2.11 - "The Kurgan" or Plague?]] Back: [[2.9 - Wheels]]